Plants not cespitose. Culms obtusely or acutely angled, 20–120 cm, glabrous. Leaves: basal sheaths red-brown; sheaths of proximal leaves bladeless, scabrous, fronts with red-brown spots, prominently ladder-fibrillose, apex U-shaped, red-brown; blades hypostomic, 3–7 mm wide, coriaceous, papillose abaxially. Inflorescences: proximal bract longer than inflorescence, 3–6 mm wide. Spikes arching, at least the proximal pendent; staminate 2–3(–5); pistillate 2–5; proximal pistillate spike usually sessile, 2.5–15 cm × 5–10 mm, base attenuate. Pistillate scales red-brown, longer and wider than perigynia, apex acute, awnless. Perigynia divergent, brown, veinless, somewhat inflated, loosely enclosing achenes, ellipsoid or obovoid, 2.2–3.8 × 1.4–2.2 mm, leathery, glossy, apex rounded, glabrous; beak colorless or with red-brown spots, 0.1–0.3 mm, orifice hyaline. Achenes often constricted on 1 or both margins, glossy; style base often bent. 2n = 70, 72, 74.
Wet, shallow, inundated woods, meadows, roadside ditches, coastal swamps, lakeshores, bogs, marshes, and riverbanks; at elevations up to 900 metres
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