FIELD ID CHARACTERISTICS:
All Carex spp. have "v" shaped leaf blades with distinctive keels. All sedges also have triangular flowering stems (in cross-section). Identification to species requires mature fruits and seeds (achenes).
Description: A medium to large, clumping, grass-like sedge usually 0.3 to 1 m tall. Stems solid and triangular.
Leaves: Fine leaves with distinct linear indent, or keel, at midrib. Leaves longer than flowering stems.
Flowers/Fruit: Flowering stems shorter than leaves. Many bristles extend outward from dense inflorescences. Individual perigynia quite flattened. Inflorescence contains male and female flowers crowded in separate cylindrical clusters on the same plant. All Carex species share the feature of seeds (achenes) being completely encompassed by an outer covering (perigynium). Flowers and fruits later then many other Carex species, from June through August.
Habit and Range: Brownwater floodplains and bottomlands statewide. Less common in the outer Coastal Plain.
