Rhynchospora harveyi
Rhynchospora debilis
Harvey's beaksedge
savannah beaksedge
erect to excurved, leafy, obscurely trigonous, slender.
erect to arching or spreading, leafy, ± filiform, ± terete, stiff to rather lax.
spreading to ascending, shorter than culm, crowded toward culm base;
blades linear, proximally flat, 1–3 mm wide, gradually involute, apically trigonous, subulate.
exceeded by culm;
blades linearfiliform, proximally shallowly concave, 1 mm, apex tapering, trigonous, blunt or broadly acute.
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.
spikelet clusters 1–2, mostly compact, turbinate to hemispheric; leafy bracts setaceous, exceeding spikelet clusters.
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.
dark redbrown, ovoid, 2–3 mm, apex acute;
fertile scales obovate, 1.5–1.7(–2) mm, apex broadly rounded or retuse, midrib excurrent as cusp or mucro to 0.5 mm.
perianth bristles mostly 6, rarely reaching fruit midbody, antrorsely barbellate.
bristles 6 or vestigial, rarely reaching fruit midbody, antrorsely barbellate.
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.
1–2 per spikelet,1.7–2 mm;
body brown with large pale center, lenticular, broadly obovoid to ± orbicular, 1.2–1.5 × 1.4–1.6 mm;
tubercle flat, triangular, concave-sided, 0.4–0.6 mm, sometimes apiculate.
Rhynchospora harveyi
Rhynchospora debilis
Varieties 2 (2 in the flora).
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Rhynchospora debilis is very similar to R. wrightiana except it has smaller spikelet clusters and more depressed fruit tubercles. It is a common invader of cutover and bulldozed low pineland where it assumes a lowspreading habit, its many culms radiating from the common center much like spokes in a wheel.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
1. Fruit body broadly obovoid to suborbicular, medially with mostly isodiametric tiny alveoli or pits, or minutely raised reticulate in an almost honeycomb pattern of alveolae, or simply evenly finely cancellate; ultimate spikelet complexes with clusters on stiffish branchlets, usually dense and exceeded at least by subulate tips of subtending leafy bract and bractlets. | var. harveyi |
1. Fruit body obovoid, lenticular, medially with oblong or roundish pitlike alveoli, intervals between contiguous transverse rows forming shallow, broad, pale, smooth ridges; ultimate spikelet clusters more sparse, on more slender, lax, erect to excurved branches and exceeding subtending bracts and bractlets. | var. culixa |
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