Flora of North America species comparison

erect to excurved, leafy, obscurely trigonous, slender.

erect to excurved, filiform, leafy, ± terete.

spreading to ascending, shorter than culm, crowded toward culm base;

blades linear, proximally flat, 1–3 mm wide, gradually involute, apically trigonous, subulate.

shorter than culm;

blades ascending, filiform, proximally to 1.5(–2)mm wide, apex trigonous, tapering, setaceous.

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.

lateral spikelet clusters (0–)1–2, distant, terminal cluster ellipsoid to broadly turbinate or hemispheric, branches ascending; leafy bracts setaceous, overtopping 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.

red-brown to deep brown, lanceoloid, (4–)5–6(–7) mm, apex acute;

fertile scales lanceolate, 4–5(–6) mm, apex acuminate, midrib often excurrent as awn.

perianth bristles mostly 6, rarely reaching fruit midbody, antrorsely barbellate.

bristles 5–6, longest reaching at least past tubercle base, mostly to tip or beyond, 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.

2(–3) per spikelet, (2.3–)2.5–2.6(–3) mm with pedicellar joint, receptacle, and tubercle;

body lustrous, pale brown to deep brown, obovoid to ellipsoid, lenticular, 1–1.5 × 1 mm, margins narrow, flowing to tubercle;

surfaces longitudinally finely lined, transversely very finely ridged with wavy rows of very narrow, vertical lattices, sometimes also with lines of shallow pits;

tubercle triangularsubulate, (0.7–)1–1.3(–1.5) mm, base lunate, margins setulose proximally.