Monographs Details:
Authority:

Mori, S. A., et al. 1997. Guide to the vascular plants of central French Guiana: Part 1. Pteridophytes, gymnosperms, and monocotyledons. Mem. New York Bot. Gard. 76: 1-422.
Family:

Cyperaceae
Description:

Species Description - Caespitose perennials; culms erect, 1-2.5 m tall, the angles barely scabrous. Leaves mostly cauline, doubly plicate, 3-5-veined; sheath 10-20 cm long, pale green with darker green wings 2-5 mm broad, the contraligule narrowly triangular, 2.5-7 cm long, green, unappendaged, the apex acute; blade 30-80 X 1.8-3.3 cm, scabrous along margins, green adaxially and abaxially. Inflorescences of 4 or 5 arching, elongate panicles, the lateral panicles subtended by leaf-like bracts, the terminal panicle longest, 15-25 cm long, with long arching secondary branches, green; secondary panicle branches with evenly spaced spikelet clusters or often forming tertiary panicles; spikelet clusters typically comprising 1 or 2 sessile or subsessile pistillate spikelets, 1-3 sessile to pedicellate staminate spikelets, and often a short additional branch 2-5 mm long terminating in a similar spikelet cluster; staminate spikelets 2.2-3 X 0.7-1.1 mm, brown, the scales ± distichous; pistillate spikelets obovoid, 2.8-3.2 X 1.3-1.7 mm (in flower), distending and opening when fruit matures, the scales ± distichous. Hypogynium cup-like, enclosing basal 0.3-0.4 mm of fruit, broadly 3-lobed, tan to yellowish, ciliate with reddish or black hairs 0.5-0.7 mm long. Fruits ovoid to spherical, 1.9-2.2 X 2.1-2.2 mm, shiny white to beige, bony; style base persistent, capping fruit, conical, 0.7-1 X 0.8-0.9 mm, black. Fr (Jun-Nov); moist forests and adjacent open areas and stream sides.

Distribution:

French Guiana South America|