Kansas Wildflowers and Grasses - Inflated narrow-leaf sedge

INFLATED NARROW-LEAF SEDGE

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Carex grisea Wahlenb.

Chase County, Kansas

Perennial

Height: 6-36 inches

Family: Cyperaceae - Sedge Family

Flowering Period: May, June

Culms:

Erect to spreading, basally purplish red, slender, triangular.

Leaves:

Blades green to pale green, flat, .5 to 20 inches long, .16 to .35 inch wide, smooth abaxially.

Sheaths:

Glabrous

Inflorescences:

Bracts leaf-like, distal bract exceeds inflorescence; spikes (3-)4-5(-6), upper 2-4 overlapping; terminal spike staminate, sessile or nearly so, .28 to 1.4 inch, barely exceeding lateral spike; staminate scales hyaline to pale brown, narrowly oblong, .12 to .2 inch, acute to acuminate; lateral spikes 3-5, pistillate, uppermost sessile to short-stalked, lowermost stalked, .2 to 1.2 inch long, .18 to .4 inch thick; pistillate scales hyaline with green midrib, sometimes red-spotted, ovate, .16 to .3 inch long, .08 to .2 inch wide, about as long as perigynia, apex with awn; perigynia 3-15 per spike, spirally overlapping, narrowly ellipsoid to obovoid, .18 to .22 inch, glabrous.

Fruits:

Achenes, yellowish brown, obovoid, .1 to .14 inch, apex abruptly short-pointed; stigmas 3.

Habitat:

Bottomland woods, stream margins, roadside ditches, ravine slopes.

Distribution:

East 1/2 of Kansas

Origin:

Native

Comments:

Carex grisea is common and widespread. It forms dense tufts

Inflated narrow-leaf sedge terminal and lateral spikes