Carex parryana Dewey

Stems 2–6 dm, loosely tufted on short, scaly creeping rhizomes, phyllopodic, the principal lvs crowded near the base, seldom over 15(–25) cm, flat to channeled and revolute-margined, to ca 4 mm wide; spikes 1–5, the terminal one (1–)1.5–3 cm, often longer than the others, these sessile or stiffly short-pedunculate and ± erect; spikes often all wholly pistillate, or the terminal one frequently staminate, or gynaecandrous, or with intermingled male and female fls; bract subtending the lowest spike scarcely sheathing, usually short and inconspicuous, rarely as long as the infl; pistillate scales stramineous to more often brown with pale, hyaline margins, broadly obtuse and shorter than the perigynia to narrower, acute, and surpassing the perigynia; perigynia ± distinctly obovate, 1.9–3 mm including the short (0.2–0.6 mm) or obsolete beak, often short-hairy distally, 2-ribbed, otherwise nerveless or inconspicuously several-nerved; achene trigonous, rather loosely filling the perigynium. Meadows, swales, and moist low ground on the prairies and high plains; widespread in interior w. U.S. and s. Can., e. to w. Minn. (C. hallii)