Plants perennial, forming dense clumps, often stoloniferous. Rhizomes present, caudexlike, mostly concealed by crowded culms, vertical or ascending, 2 mm thick; internodes very short, scales disintegrating to fibers, 4 mm, papery. Culms erect to ascending or arching, acutely quadrangular, deeply sulcate, 7–50 cm × 0.3–0.5 mm, smooth, firm. Leaves: distal leaf sheaths persistent, proximally brown or reddish, distally stramineous to green, thickly membranous, apex acute or subacute. Spikelets: basal spikelets absent; often proliferous, ovoid, terete, 3–10 × 2–3 mm, apex acute; proximal scale empty, amplexicaulous, similar to floral scales; subproximal scale with a flower; floral scales spiraled, 8–15, 4 per mm of rachilla, orange-brown, midrib region broadly stramineous or like flanks, ovate, 2–3 × 1.2–2 mm, membranous, midrib evident to prominent, apex acute (to rounded). Flowers: perianth bristles 6 or fewer, stramineous, unequal, some or most equaling achene, spinules obscure, sparse, retrorse, sharply acute. Stamens 3; anthers 1.2–1.5 mm. Styles 3-fid. Achenes stramineous, broadly obpyriform, equilaterally trigonous, angles evident, blunt, 0.9–1.1 × 0.7–0.9 mm, apex nearly truncate, smooth or obscurely papillose or rugulose at 20X. Tubercles stramineous, pyramidal, trigonous, usually acute, proximally trilobed, the lobes decurrent on achene, 0.5–0.9 × 0.7–0.9 mm.
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