Isolepis cernua |
Isolepis carinata |
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fiberoptic grass, low bulrush, low clubrush, low lateral clubrush, tuft clubrush |
keel bulrush, keel club rush |
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Habit | Plants annual (or perennial?); rhizomes usually obscured by culm bases and very short, sometimes vertical and elongated. | Plants annual; rhizomes absent. |
Culms | 4–40 cm × 0.2–0.5 mm. |
1–25 cm × 0.2–0.3 mm. |
Leaves | sometimes sparsely orange-punctate at 10–15X; sheaths usually reddish proximally; distal blade rudimentary to much longer than sheath, often exceeding culm, to 20 cm × 0.2–1 mm. |
sheaths green to stramineous or brown; distal blade mostly much longer than sheath, to 5 cm × 0.2–0.5 mm. |
Inflorescences | involucral bract 1, sometimes subtending flower or resembling enlarged floral scale, 2–6(–23) mm. |
involucral bract 1, 5–25(–33) mm. |
Spikelets | 2–5 × 1–2 mm; scales partly or completely dark orange to red-brown, rarely stramineous, midrib greenish to stramineous, not gibbous, obscurely to prominently 3–11-veined, midrib keeled near apex, membranous, hyaline, apex rounded to acute, with mucro less than 0.1 mm; proximal scale to 2 mm; other scales 1.2–1.8 × 1–1.3 mm. |
1–10 × 1.5–2 mm; scales stramineous to pale orangish, midrib region often greenish, markedly gibbous, prominently to obscurely veined, midrib keeled, finely reticulate at 20X, membranous, hyaline, apex rounded, awned; proximal scale to 2.5(–5) mm, awn to 2 mm; other scales 1.8–2 × 1–1.2 mm, awn 0.2–0.5 mm. |
Flowers | anthers 0.3–0.6 mm; styles 3-fid or 3-fid and 2-fid. |
anthers 0.2 mm; styles 3-fid. |
Achenes | falling separately from scales, medium to dark brown or stramineous, ellipsoid to obovoid, compressed-trigonous to thickly biconvex, lateral angles usually prominent, abaxial angle prominent to obscure, faces convex or adaxial face slightly concave, 0.8–1 × 0.5–0.7 mm, distinctly papillose at 10–15X to obscurely papillose at 40X, often with thin whitish surface layer. |
often falling with and clasped by floral scales, dark orange-brown or often whitish, broadly ellipsoid to obovoid or outline subcircular, nearly equilaterally trigonous, faces concave, 1–1.5 × 0.7–1 mm, papillose at 10–15X, papillae in many vertical rows, often obscured by thin, minutely reticulate, whitish surface layer. |
2n | = 30. |
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Isolepis cernua |
Isolepis carinata |
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Phenology | Fruiting late spring–winter (Pacific Coast), winter–spring (Texas). | Fruiting spring. |
Habitat | Wet, freshwater to brackish places on beaches, dunes, marine bluffs, sandy areas, mostly coastal | Wet, often drying, freshwater places in grasslands, rock barrens, open woods, lawns, cultivated fields, waste places |
Elevation | 0–800 m (0–2600 ft) | 0–800 m (0–2600 ft) |
Distribution |
CA; OR; TX; WA; BC; Mexico (Baja California); temperate South America; Eurasia; Africa; Australia; New Zealand
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AL; AR; CA; FL; GA; IL; KS; KY; LA; MO; MS; NC; OK; SC; TN; TX
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Discussion | Isolepis cernua is widespread and variable. Four varieties were recognized by A. M. Muasya and D. M. Simpson (2002). Only var. ceruna is known from North America. The earliest collection I have seen from the Pacific Coast is from 1888; the earliest collection I have seen from Texas is from 1974. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Isolepis carinata sometimes occurs in mixed populations with the very similar I. pseudosetacea. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Source | FNA vol. 23, p. 139. | FNA vol. 23, p. 138. |
Parent taxa | Cyperaceae > Isolepis | Cyperaceae > Isolepis |
Sibling taxa | ||
Synonyms | Scirpus cernuus, Scirpus cernuus var. californicus, Scirpus cernuus subsp. californicus | I. koilolepis, Scirpus carinatus, Scirpus koilolepis |
Name authority | (Vahl) Roemer & Schultes: in J. J. Roemer et al., Syst. Veg. 2: 106. (1817) | Hooker & Arnott ex Torrey: Ann. Lyceum Nat. Hist. New York 3: 349. (1836) |
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