Rhynchospora holoschoenoides (Rich.) Herter

A glabrous perennial with the plant base a rounded, hard thickening, covered by fibres formed from the older leaf-bases, set at the end of a short curving scaly stolon, and emitting new thick stolons. Culms 30-60 cm long, triangular. Leaves numerous, mostly basal, but some from the lower 2/3 of the culm, stiff and ascending but curved at the tips, scabrid on margin; lower leaf-sheaths split, upper with a membranous tongue opposite the blade. Inflorescence a simple anthela of one sessile and usually 1-5 stalked globular heads of spikelets, each subtended by a leafy inflorescence-bract; the largest bract overtopping the inflorescence. Heads pale golden, with numerous, strongly crowded spikelets, about 10 mm in diam. Spikelets 4-5 mm long, lanceolate, each subtended by a small long-awned bract and a blunt and unnerved prophyil at the base, and with 5 more glumes. Glumes 1 and 2 sterile, 3 subtending a bisexual flower and 4 and 5 male flowers. Lower glumes with a strong nerve continued into a short spine, upper membranous and without spines, closely enwrapping the flowers below. Hypogynous bristles 6, as long as or longer than the nutlet, set with minute spines directed towards their tips. Stamens elongate with short, blunt apiculi. Ovary surmounted by a long stout beak carrying a thin deciduous unbranched or minutely bifid style. Nutlet urn-shaped, bordered by thickened rims running into shoulders bearing short triangular hairs; beak yellowish about as long as the body of the fruit, grooved on its ventral and dorsal surfaces.

In marshes, swamps and damp grassland, generally near surface water which may be brackish.