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Habit Plants perennial, densely cespitose, 15–50(–60) cm; rhizomes absent.
Culms

erect or arching, leafy toward base, filiform, terete, wiry.

Leaves

overtopped by culm;

blades linear to filiform, channeled, 0.3–0.5 mm wide, margins deeply involute, apex setaceous.

Inflorescences

spikelet clusters 1–2(–3), dense to open, narrowly to broadly turbinate;

branches capillary, variously elongate; leafy bracts setaceous, equaling or exceeding clusters.

Spikelets

variously brown, ellipsoid, 2–3 mm, apex sharply acute;

fertile scales ovate to nearly orbiculate, rounded, 1.2–1.8 mm, apiculate, convexcupulate, midrib slender, mostly included.

Flowers

perianth absent.

Fruits

2–3 per spikelet, 0.7–0.9(–1) mm;

body pale, obovoid-lenticular, (0.5–)0.6–0.9 × 0.4–0.5 mm, margin wirelike;

surfaces transversely rugulose;

tubercle buttonlike, depressed triangular, 0.05–0.1 mm, base lunate atop rounded fruit body.

Rhynchospora pusilla

Phenology Fruiting summer–fall.
Habitat Moist sands, peats and silts of low meadows, savannas, bogs, seeps, pond shores
Elevation 0–300 m (0–1000 ft)
Distribution
from FNA
AL; FL; GA; LA; MS; NC; SC; TX; Mexico; Central America; West Indies
[BONAP county map]
Source FNA vol. 23, p. 220.
Parent taxa Cyperaceae > Rhynchospora
Sibling taxa
R. alba, R. baldwinii, R. brachychaeta, R. breviseta, R. caduca, R. californica, R. capillacea, R. capitellata, R. careyana, R. cephalantha, R. chalarocephala, R. chapmanii, R. ciliaris, R. colorata, R. compressa, R. corniculata, R. crinipes, R. curtissii, R. debilis, R. decurrens, R. divergens, R. elliottii, R. eximia, R. fascicularis, R. fernaldii, R. filifolia, R. floridensis, R. fusca, R. globularis, R. glomerata, R. gracilenta, R. grayi, R. harperi, R. harveyi, R. indianolensis, R. inexpansa, R. inundata, R. knieskernii, R. kunthii, R. latifolia, R. macra, R. macrostachya, R. megalocarpa, R. megaplumosa, R. microcarpa, R. microcephala, R. miliacea, R. mixta, R. nitens, R. nivea, R. odorata, R. oligantha, R. pallida, R. perplexa, R. pineticola, R. pleiantha, R. plumosa, R. punctata, R. rariflora, R. recognita, R. scirpoides, R. solitaria, R. stenophylla, R. thornei, R. torreyana, R. tracyi, R. wrightiana
Synonyms Phaeocephalum pusillum, R. intermixta
Name authority Chapman ex M. A. Curtis: Amer. J. Sci. Arts, ser. 2, 7: 409. (1849)
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