Carex echinata Murray

• Authority

  Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.

• Family

  Cyperaceae

• Scientific Name

  Carex echinata Murray

• Description

  Species Description - Stems densely tufted, aphyllopodic, 1–6 dm, scabrous on the angles above; lvs 3–6 per stem, all in the basal third, to about as long as the stems, plicate, mostly 1–2.5 mm wide; spikes 3–7, sessile, small and few-fld, the terminal one with a conspicuous, slender, staminate base, some of the lateral ones often wholly pistillate; bracts small and inconspicuous; anthers 0.8–1.6 mm; perigynia 5–15, crowded, widely spreading or the lower reflexed, green or tan, planoconvex, spongy-thickened at base, lightly several- to many-nerved dorsally, few- to several-nerved or virtually nerveless ventrally, narrowly lance-triangular to move commonly lance-ovate or even ovate, 2.8–3.5(–4) mm, 1.8–3.2 times as long as wide, often serrulate-margined distally, with a prominent, slender, serrulate-margined, sharply bidentate beak 1–1.6 mm, half as long to almost as long as the body; achene lenticular; 2n=50–58. Swamps, bogs, and other wet places; circumboreal, s. to Va. (and in the mts. to N.C.), Ind., Io., Utah, and Calif. Ours is the widespread var. echinata. (C. angustior; C. cephalantha; C. josselynii; C. laricina; C. muricata, misapplied; C. stellulata)

• Common Names

  star-sedge