Rhynchospora harperi |
Rhynchospora harveyi |
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Harper's beaksedge |
Harvey's beaksedge |
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Habit | Plants perennial, solitary or cespitose, 50–70 cm; rhizomes absent. | Plants perennial, cespitose, 70–110 cm; rhizomes absent. | ||||
Culms | erect to excurved, leafybased, narrowly linear, ± terete. |
erect to excurved, leafy, obscurely trigonous, slender. |
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Leaves | shorter than culm; blades ascending, narrowly linear, proximally flat or margins slightly involute, 0.5–1(–2) mm wide, distally canaliculate, apex trigonous, tapering, subulate. |
spreading to ascending, shorter than culm, crowded toward culm base; blades linear, proximally flat, 1–3 mm wide, gradually involute, apically trigonous, subulate. |
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Inflorescences | spikelet clusters 1–3, laterals 0–2, all turbinate to hemispheric, terminal internode usually excurved; leafy bracts setaceous, overtopping inflorescence. |
spikelet clusters 1–4, dense to open, mostly irregularly turbinate; peduncles ascending, branches spreading to erect, ultimate branches with many spikelets; leafy bracts setaceoustipped, usually exceeding all clusters, or at least all but the distal. |
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Spikelets | redbrown, lanceoloid, 5–7 mm, apex acute; fertile scales lanceolate, (2.5–)4–5 mm, apex acute to acuminate; midrib paralleled by several indistinct ribs, excurrent as short awns. |
light redbrown or brown, broadly ellipsoid to lanceoloid, 3–4 mm, apex acute to acuminate; fertile scales ovate to obovate or suborbiculate, 2–3.5 mm apex acute to rounded or emarginate, midrib included or exserted as mucro. |
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Flowers | bristles 6, reaching from mid tubercle to beyond tip. |
perianth bristles mostly 6, rarely reaching fruit midbody, antrorsely barbellate. |
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Fruits | 3(–4) per spikelet, 2.1–2.5 mm; stipe and receptacle 0.2–0.3 mm, sparsely setose and setulose; body glossy, brown with pale center, obovoid-lenticular, 1.1–1.5 × 1–1.1 mm, surfaces finely longitudinally lined, variably low papillatecancellate, also often transversely with wavy lines of dark dots; tubercle flattened, triangular-subulate, (0.8–)0.9–1(–1.1) mm, setulose-ciliate. |
mostly 1 per spikelet, 2–2.5 mm, body dark brown, obovoid to subglobose, tumid or lenticular, 1.5–1.7 mm, transversely finely rugose to nearly level, intervals with very small, pitlike alveoli. |
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Rhynchospora harperi |
Rhynchospora harveyi |
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Phenology | Fruiting summer–fall. | |||||
Habitat | Sands and peats of bogs, stream banks, edges of pineland savanna ponds, Hypericum ponds | |||||
Elevation | 0–100 m (0–300 ft) | |||||
Distribution |
AL; DE; FL; GA; MD; MS; NC; SC; Central America (Belize)
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AL; AR; FL; GA; KS; LA; MO; MS; NC; OK; SC; TN; TX; VA; se United States; Midwestern |
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Discussion | Rhynchospora harperi is most abundant in a very special habitat referred to here as the “Hypericum pond.” These are typically shallow ponds in pine savannas, frequently ringed by stands of Nyssa, Taxodium, Ilex, and Cyrilla, but most of the pond itself is dominated by one or more myriandrous shrubby Hypericum species. Here R. harperi is distinguished from other species by the often abrupt bend of its ultimate internode. (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
Varieties 2 (2 in the flora). (Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.) |
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Key |
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Source | FNA vol. 23, p. 233. | FNA vol. 23, p. 231. | ||||
Parent taxa | Cyperaceae > Rhynchospora | Cyperaceae > Rhynchospora | ||||
Sibling taxa | ||||||
Subordinate taxa | ||||||
Synonyms | R. fascicularis var. harperi, R. leptorhyncha | |||||
Name authority | Small: Man. S.E. Fl., 182, 1503. (1933) | W. Boott: Bot. Gaz. 9: 85. (1884) | ||||
Web links |