Flora of North America species comparison

slender, ± filiform, leafy, terete to bluntly trigonous.

erect or spreadingarching, linearfiliform, terete, leafy toward base.

shorter than culm;

blades spreading to ascending, ± filiform, proximally flat, 0.5–1(–1.5) mm, apex tapering, trigonous.

overtopped by culm;

blades ascending, filiform, 0.3–0.5 mm wide, margins deeply involute, then channeled, apex trigonous, setaceous.

spikelet clusters 1–3, loose to dense, widely spaced to close together, turbinate to hemispheric; leafy bracts setaceous, mostly exceeding spikelet clusters.

spikelet clusters 1–2(–4), dense(–open), narrowly to broadly turbinate;

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

dark redbrown, lanceovoid, 2.5–3.5(–4) mm, apex acute;

fertile scales ovate, 2–3.5 mm, apex acute or acuminate, rarely minutely awned.

brownish, lanceellipsoid to fusiform, 2–2.5(–3) mm, apex acute;

fertile scales broadly elliptic, 1.5 mm, apex narrowly rounded to broadly acute, apiculate, convexcupulate, midrib narrow, shortexcurrent or included.

bristles 6, of various length, mostly extending from fruit midbody to tubercle base, antrorsely barbellate.

perianth absent.

1–2 per spikelet, (2–)2–2.5 mm;

body brown with pale center, lenticular, broadly ellipsoid, 1.5–1.7 × 1.2–1.3 mm, surfaces nearly smooth or very finely cancellate;

tubercle flat, triangular with short-oblong, blunttipped nose, or triangularsubulate, 0.5–0.8 mm.

1–3 or more per spikelet, (0.6–)0.7–0.9(–1) mm;

body pale, glassy, obovoidlenticular, 0.6–0.7 × 0.4–0.5 mm, margins narrow, wirelike;

surfaces finely striate, very finely reticulate;

tubercle button depressedtriangular or patelliform, 0.1–0.15 mm, apiculate.