Flora of North America species comparison

lax, filiform, leafy.

erect with arching tops, leafy, obscurely trigonous, slender.

spreading to ascending, exceeding or exceeded by culm;

blades 0.2–0.3 mm wide, margins strongly involute or channeled, apex trigonous, tapering, setaceous.

overtopped by inflorescence;

blades linear, proximally flat, 3–5 mm wide, apex trigonous, subulate, tapering.

cluster of cymes 1–2, widely spaced, turbinate, sparse;

branches few; foliaceous bracts setaceous, longer than cymes.

spikelet clusters mostly 4–6, various in shape and crowding, narrowly to broadly turbinate;

peduncles erect, branches slender, ascending; leafy bracts exceeding all but most distal clusters.

brown, lanceovoid to fusiform, 2.5–3 mm, apex acuminate;

fertile scales ovate, 1.5 mm, apex acute, midrib shortexcurrent.

redbrown, broadly ellipsoid, (1.5–)2–3(–3.5) mm, apex acute;

fertile scales broadly ovate, 2–3 mm, midrib excurrent as apiculus or awn.

perianth absent.

perianth bristles 6, mostly spreading, usually exceeding tubercle, antrorsely barbellate.

0.9–1 mm;

body lustrous pale brown, ellipsoidlenticular, 0.8–0.9 × 0.5–0.6 mm, margins narrow, wirelike;

surfaces minutely reticulate;

bristles 4–6, the longest from shorter than fruit midbody to fully as long, rarely reaching tubercle tip, minutely antrorsely barbellate;

tubercle shortconic, to 0.15 mm.

2–3(–4) per spikelet, 1.5(–1.7) mm;

body pale brown to brown, strongly flattened, obovoidorbicular, 1–1.2 × 0.8–1.1;

surfaces transversely wavyrugose, intervals vertically striate with very narrowly rectangular alveolae;

tubercle flat, triangular or concavely triangular, 0.3–0.5(–0.7) mm.