The green links below add additional plants to the comparison table. Blue links lead to other Web sites.
enable glossary links

rhynchospore blanc, white beak-rush, white beaksedge

Habit Plants perennial, densely cespitose, 6–75 cm; rhizomes mostly absent.
Culms

erect to curved, leafy, obscurely trigonous to nearly terete, few ribbed, slender.

Inflorescences

clusters 1 or 2–3, then widely spaced, narrowly turbinate to hemispheric, 1.5–2.5 cm wide; subtending leafy bracts often exceeded by distal cluster.

Spikelets

pale brown to nearly white, ellipsoid, 3.5–5.5 mm, apex acute;

fertile scales elliptic, 3–3.5(–4) mm, apex acute or acuminate, midrib excurrent as mucro.

Flowers

perianth bristles 10–12, slightly overtopping tubercle, retrorsely barbellate or rarely smooth, base often setose.

Fruits

1(–2) per spikelet, (2.3–)2.5–3 mm;

body pale brown with paler center, stipitateobovoid, lenticular, 1.5–1.8(–2) × 0.9–1.2 mm;

surfaces transversely striate, relatively smooth, rim narrow, flowing to tubercle base;

tubercle narrowly triangularsubulate, 0.5–1.2 mm.

Principal

leaves mostly overtopped by culm;

blades narrowly linear to filiform, proximally flat, 0.5–1.5 mm, apex tapering, trigonous.

Rhynchospora alba

Phenology Fruiting summer–fall.
Habitat Acid, sphagnous, boggy, open sites, poor fens, often on floating mats or peaty interstices of rocky shores
Elevation 0–2000 m (0–6600 ft)
Distribution
from FNA
AK; CA; CT; DE; GA; ID; IL; IN; MA; MD; ME; MI; MN; NC; NH; NJ; NY; OH; OR; PA; RI; SC; TN; VA; VT; WA; WI; WV; AB; BC; MB; NB; NF; NS; NT; ON; PE; QC; SK; Fla(?); West Indies (Puerto Rico); South America(?); Eurasia
[WildflowerSearch map]
[BONAP county map]
Discussion

The smooth-bristled Rhynchospora alba forma laeviseta Gale mostly occurs with the typical antrorsely barbellate type in Pennsylvania, the Great Lakes, British Columbia, Newfoundland, and Nova Scotia.

(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)

Source FNA vol. 23, p. 214.
Parent taxa Cyperaceae > Rhynchospora
Sibling taxa
R. baldwinii, R. brachychaeta, R. breviseta, R. caduca, R. californica, R. capillacea, R. capitellata, R. careyana, R. cephalantha, R. chalarocephala, R. chapmanii, R. ciliaris, R. colorata, R. compressa, R. corniculata, R. crinipes, R. curtissii, R. debilis, R. decurrens, R. divergens, R. elliottii, R. eximia, R. fascicularis, R. fernaldii, R. filifolia, R. floridensis, R. fusca, R. globularis, R. glomerata, R. gracilenta, R. grayi, R. harperi, R. harveyi, R. indianolensis, R. inexpansa, R. inundata, R. knieskernii, R. kunthii, R. latifolia, R. macra, R. macrostachya, R. megalocarpa, R. megaplumosa, R. microcarpa, R. microcephala, R. miliacea, R. mixta, R. nitens, R. nivea, R. odorata, R. oligantha, R. pallida, R. perplexa, R. pineticola, R. pleiantha, R. plumosa, R. punctata, R. pusilla, R. rariflora, R. recognita, R. scirpoides, R. solitaria, R. stenophylla, R. thornei, R. torreyana, R. tracyi, R. wrightiana
Synonyms Schoenus albus, Dichromena alba, Phaeocephalum album, R. luguillensis, Triodon albus
Name authority (Linnaeus) Vahl: Enum. Pl. 2: 236. (1805)
Web links