Carex festucacea

SPECIES

1. KingdomPlantae
2. PhylumTracheophyta
3. ClassLiliopsida
4. OrderPoales
5. FamilyCyperaceae

Native toAlabama, Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana

Observations recorded3,681

Plants cespitose. Culms 45–100 cm; vegetative culms few, inconspicuous, usually fewer than 15 leaves, not strikingly 3-ranked, leaves clustered at apex. Leaves: sheaths green or with white intervenal areas, often adaxially white-hyaline, summits U-shaped or prolonged to 2 mm beyond collar; sheaths finely papillose or smooth; distal ligules 1–3 mm; blades 3–5 per fertile culm, 15–30 cm × 1–3.5 mm. Inflorescences arching or nodding, ± open, green to light brown, 2.5–6 cm × 4.5–11 mm; proximal internode 3–18 mm; 2d internode 3–13 mm; proximal bracts scalelike or with bristle tips shorter than inflorescences. Spikes 3–10, distinct, ellipsoid to globose, 6–16 × 5–6.5 mm, base acute to attenuate, apex rounded; terminal spike with conspicuous staminate base. Pistillate scales white-hyaline with white, green, or gold center, broadly lanceolate, 2.3–3.8 mm, shorter than and narrower than perigynia, apex acute. Anthers 1–2.1 mm. Perigynia (20–)25–60 in larger spikes, spreading, pale green to yellowish brown, conspicuously 5-veined or more abaxially, veinless or mostly indistinctly or basally 2–4(–6)-veined adaxially, orbiculate to elliptic, plano-convex, 2.5–4.2 × 1.5–2.3(–2.5) mm, 0.4–0.6 m