Flora of North America species comparison

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

erect or excurved, filiform to linear.

erect or excurved, shorter than scape;

blades filiform to linear, to 1.5 mm wide, margins involute, apex trigonous, tapering.

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.

spikelet clusters 1–several, dense or sparse, when several, either widely spaced or close together, if widely spaced then ovoid to hemispheric, if close together then lobed ellipse or cylinder; leafy bracts filiform, setaceous, overtopping each cluster.

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.

light redbrown to deep brown, broadly fusiform to ovoid, (2.5–)3.5–4 mm, apex acute to acuminate;

fertile scale broadly ovate, strongly convex, (1.5–)2–3 mm, apex acuminate to mucronate, midrib excurrent or not.

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

perianth bristles 6, plumose, reaching at least to fruit midbody, often to tubercle tip.

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.

1(–2) per spikelet, (1.5–)2–2.5 mm;

body redbrown or brown, tumidly obovoid or ellipsoid, sometimes obscurely lenticular, (1.2–)1.3–1.8(–2) × 1–1.5 mm;

surfaces interruptedly crossrugulose;

tubercle narrowly to broadly conic, mostly 0.3–0.5 mm, base flaring, round or indistinctly 2lobed.

leaves mostly overtopped by culm;

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