Rhynchospora latifolia
Rhynchospora gracilenta
sandswamp whitetop
slender beaksedge
arching or erect, leafy-based, distally wandlike, terete, multiribbed.
mostly lax, ascending to leaningexcurved, leafy, linear to filiform, terete.
ascending to spreading, overtopped by scape;
blades linear, proximally flat, 2.5–5 mm wide, apex subulate, trigonous.
shorter than culm;
blades ascending, filiform to narrowly linear, proximally flat, 0.5–1.5(–2.5) mm wide, margins distally strongly involute, apex trigonous, tapering.
terminal, headlike clusters of spikelets, clusters dense, leafy-involucrate;
involucral bracts several, spreading to downcurved, longest 6–13 cm × 5–10 mm, mostly white to midbract, then green, abruptly narrowly linear.
spikelet clusters 1–3(–4), proximalmost distant, dense to sparse, narrowly turbinate to hemispheric;
peduncles and branches ascending; leafy bracts linearsetaceous, mostly overtopping clusters.
white, ovoid, 5–7 mm;
fertile scales boatshaped, sharply curved-keeled, 5 mm, apex acute.
redbrown, ovoid to lanceoloid, (3.5–)4–5 mm, apex acute;
fertile scales ovate, 3–4.5 mm, apex acute, mucronate to awnedcuspidate.
perianth absent.
bristles 6, mostly reaching tip of tubercle or beyond, antrorsely barbellate.
several per spikelet, 1.5–2 mm;
body yellowish to deep brown, tumidly lenticular, broadly obovoid to orbicular or oblate, 1.5 mm, widest at or toward midbody, margins flowing to tubercle;
surfaces with many fine rows of vertical shallow lattices, their contiguous ends making transverse rows of papillae;
tubercle crescent-based, depressed-triangular, 0.5 mm, apex acute.
1–3 per spikelet, (2.5–)3–3.5(–4.1) mm;
body dark brown with small pale center, lenticular, broadly ellipsoid to suborbicular, 1.3–2.1 × 1.3–1.5 mm, smooth, margins narrow, flowing into tubercle;
tubercle triangular-subulate, compressed, mostly 1.5–2 mm.
= 12.
Rhynchospora latifolia
Rhynchospora gracilenta
A specimen collected near Tullahoma, Tennessee, reported as Dichromena latifolia (A. Gattinger 1901), was later destroyed by fire. I did not see the specimen, nor was a description of it published. Because extant populations of the similar Rhynchospora colorata are just over the border in Alabama, that species is likely to have been the one found by Gattinger.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
Through the southern coastal plain are widerleaved examples of Rhynchospora gracilenta that are sparingly cespitose to solitary-stemmed, often with but a single terminal inflorescence with dense clusters of spikelets (var. diversifolia). That would be a tenable designation were it not for the large numbers of populations with intermediate habit.
(Discussion copyrighted by Flora of North America; reprinted with permission.)
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