Description

Key Characters:

Growth Form: Perennials with erect or ascending, branched rhizomes, forming low dense tufts.

Stems: culms short, rigid, ± branched, almost hidden in the leaf tuft and sheaths of decaying leaves.

Roots:

Leaves: Leaves simple. Leaves numerous, basal, conspicuously or inconspicuously 2-ranked, equitant. blades linear, short, channeled. Margins entire. Veins parallel. Sheaths pale brown to purplish brown, strongly dilated, open; ligule absent. Stipules absent.

Flowers: Flowers in inflorescences racemose, consisting of a few lateral spikelets or reduced to a single terminal spikelet; spikelets with 3–4 obscurely 2-ranked, deciduous glumes, with 1 flower. Flowers bisexual (perfect). Perianth of 6 small scales in 2 series, persistent at base of achene and falling with it. Corolla (petals) absent. Stamens 3. Ovary superior, 3-carpellate; style not jointed; stigmas 3.

Fruit: Achenes pyriform; obovoid or ellipsoid; obtusely trigonous; the surface smooth; glossy. Seeds 1; seed coat thin; free from pericarp; embryo basal; endosperm abundant.

Ploidy:

Habitat:

Elevation Range: