Flora of North America species comparison

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

erect or excurved, mostly filiform, leafy proximal to midculm, obtuse-angled to subterete, wiry.

overtopped by culm;

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

overtopped by culm;

blades narrowly linear, proximally flat, 1–2 mm wide, distally tapering-triquetrous.

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

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

spikelet clusters 2–3(–4), distant, narrowly turbinate to hemispheric, mostly shorter than subtending setaceous bract.

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.

red-brown, lanceoloid, 2.5–3(–4) mm, apex acuminate;

fertile scale elliptic, 2–2.5 mm, acute, midrib excurrent as cusp or aristula.

perianth absent.

bristles 6, reaching tubercle tip or beyond, antrorsely barbellate, base setose.

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.

2–4 per spikelet, 1.5–1.7 mm, on setose pedicellar joint 0.2 mm, body with faces red-brown with pale glassy center, decurrent tubercle base;

surfaces smooth;

turbercle concavely triangular, 0.4–0.6 mm, setulose-ciliate.