Many Head Sedge

Because Carex sychnocephala often lacks conspicuous rhizomes and has a small diffuse root system, it may appear to be annual. In some situations, it may actually grow as an annual.

Culms aphyllopodic, smoothly 3-angled, 8–40 cm. Leaves: sheath white-hyaline adaxially, summit U-shaped, smooth; distal ligule 0.5–4.3 mm; blades 0–3 per culm, 12 cm × 1.2–3 mm. Inflorescences green or pale brown, 1.6–3 cm × 7–15 mm; proximal internode (2–)4–8 mm, 2d internode 1.7–4 mm; bracts appressed to ascending. Spikes 3–8, densely clustered except, often, the proximal 1–2, obovoid-oblanceoloid, 10–16 × 5–7 mm, base acute to acuminate, apex truncate. Pistillate scales white- or gold-hyaline with green or gold midstripe, lanceolate to ovate, to 3.5–4.5 mm, shorter than or longer than perigynia. Perigynia appressed, green or gold to light brown, conspicuously 3–12-veined abaxially, 0–9-veined adaxially, wing 0.1–0.15(–0.2) mm wide, narrowly lanceolate, (4.6–)5.5–7.3 × 0.7–1.2 mm, 0.3–0.4 mm thick; beak tip white, green, or gold, narrowly flat, distance from beak tip to achene 3–5 mm, ± ciliate-serrulate. Achenes elliptic to ovate, 1–1.8 × 0.6–0.8 mm, 0.3–0.4 mm thick. 2n = 64.

Alta., B.C., Man., N.W.T., Ont., Que., Sask., Yukon; Alaska, Colo., Iowa, Mich., Minn., Mo., Mont., N.Y., N.Dak., S.Dak., Wash., Wis.

Fruiting summer–fall.

Wet areas, at least seasonally, open, sandy, silty or peaty shores, banks, on limestone; less than 1500m.

Carex sychnocephala Carey, Am. Jour. vSci. II. 4: 24. 1847
^' Carex cyperoides L." Dewey. Am. Jour. Sci. II. 3t 171. 1847'.
Densely cespitose, the rootstocks very short, blackish, fibrillose,the clumps mediumsizedj'*ti» culms 0.5-6 dm. high, obtusely triangular, slender to base but erect, very smooth, shorter than or exceeding the leaves, light-brown at base and clothed with the few shortbladed leaves of the previous year, the lower bladeless; leaves with well-developed blades 2-5 to a fertile culm, on the lower half, but not clustered, the blades flat, thin, light-green, erect or ascending, usually 5-20 cm. long, 1.5-4 mm. wide, roughened towards the apex and on the margins, the sheaths tight, white-hyaline ventrally, very thin at mouth and short-prolonged beyond base of blade and continuous with ligule; sterile shoots conspicuous, with several long-bladed leaves clustered near the tip; spikes 6-15, gynaecandrous, densely aggregated into an oblong or ovoid lobed head 1.5-3 cm. long, 7-15 mm. thick, the upper spikes hardly distinguishable, the lower oblong-ovoid, 8-12 mm. long, 5-7 mm. wide, erect, round-tapering at base, obtusish at apex, the staminate flowers very inconspicuous, the perig>'nia numerous, appressed-ascending with conspicuous beaks; lower 2-4 bracts elongate and leaf-like, many times exceeding head, 5-20 cm. long, 2-5 mm. wide, very rough at the apex, sheathless, manynerved, dilated and whitish-margined at base, the upper bracts short-awned or scale-like; scales lanceolate, acuminate or cuspidate, hyaline, greenish-white, with 3-nerved green center, narrower than the perig>-nia and about half their length; perigynia flat and scale-like, except where distended over achene, subulate-lanceolate, 5-6.5 mm. long, 1 mm. wide, membranaceous, greenish or straw-colored, very narrowly wing-margined to base, serrulate to base of beak, obscurely several-nerved on both faces, short-stipitate, tapering and spongy at base, tapering to a beak two to three times the length of the body, flat, serrulate, obliquely cut dorsally, light-reddish-brown-tipped, sharply bidentate; achenes lenticular, substipitate, apiculate, yellowish-brown, shining, oval, very small, 1 ram. long, 0.5 mm. wide; style very slender, straight, jointed with achene, at length deciduous; stigmas two, brownish, slender.
Type locality: "Hab. In Nov. Ebor. Comitat." Jefferson, "ubi legerunt c!. I. B. Crawe M.D., et cl. ir. A Wood. M.D."
Distribution: Meadows and thickets, Ontario and New York, westward to Saskatchewan and Montana, and southward to Iowa; very local, especially eastward. (Specimens examined from New York, Ontario. Michigan, Wisconsin, Manitoba, Minnesota. Iowa, Saskatchewan, North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana.)