Flora of North America species comparison

erect or ascending, terete to obscurely trigonous, multiribbed, densely leafybased, slender, stiff, papillose to scabridpuberulent.

forming strong rosette, distal widely spaced, much exceeded by scape;

basal leaf blades shortlinear, flat, 4–6 mm wide, culm leaf blades narrower, longer, all ciliate, apex bluntly acute.

terminal;

spikelet cluster 1, crowded, hemispheric, often lobed, to 2 cm wide;

bracts strongly ciliate distally;

longer leafy bracts exceeding cluster.

dark redbrown, ovoid, 4–5(–6) mm, apex acute;

fertile scales broadly ovate, 4–4.5 mm, apex blunt, sometimes apiculate or with mucro to 1 mm, midrib scabrid.

bristles 6, some vestigial, none reaching past fruit midbody, antrorsely barbellate.

1–2 per spikelet, (1.9–)2–2.5 mm;

body dark brown with paler center, lenticular, broadly ellipsoid to orbicular, 1.6–2 × 1.5–1.6 mm, margins flowing to tubercle;

tubercle lowtriangular, 0.5 mm, often apiculate.