Perennial. Rhizome shortly creeping. Stems rather stout, rigid, trigonous below, triquetrous above, smooth, leafy up to the top, 60-90 cm tall. Leaves rather rigid, flat or somewhat keeled, long-acumi-nate, sparsely scaberulous-pilose on the margins, revolute when dry, 4-8 mm wide; sheaths of the cauline leaves long, truncate at the mouth or with a short membranous appendage. Inflorescence spici-form or racemiform, 3-10 cm long. Spikes 2-7, sessile or shortly peduncled, dense, c. 1½ cm across, the lower ones more or less distant, the upper ones contiguous. Bracts much overtopping the inflorescence, patent, ultimately reflexed, not sheathing, up to 15 cm long. Spikelets ovate-lanceolate, stellately spreading, acute, 1-flowered, 6-7 mm long. Flower bisexual. Glumes 5-6, subdistichous, acute, keeled, ferrugineous to brown. Bristles 5-6, capillary, flexuous, smooth or almost so, about twice as long as the nut (up to 5 mm). Stamens 3; anthers c. 2 mm. Style long, bilobed (stigmas c. 2 mm). Style-base conical-subulate, glabrous, longer than the nut, brown, 4-5 mm long, ½ mm wide at the base. Nut obovate or broadly obovate, attenuate at the base, laterally compressed, biconvex, indistinctly transversely rugu-lose, shining castaneous, (1¾-)2-2¼ by 1½-1¾ mm; epidermal cells longitudinally stretched, oblong.
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Perennials. Rhizomes short, creeping. Culms erect, simple, 60-100 cm tall, rigid, with several nodes, smooth, basally obtusely 3-angled and clothed with dusky brown bladeless sheaths, apically acutely 3-angled. Leaves longer than culm; sheath elongated, tightly surrounding culm; ligule rust-colored brown, short, membranous; leaf blade broadly linear, 5-9 mm wide, flattish, apex long acuminate to acute. Involucral bracts spreading, 7-20 cm, much longer than inflorescence, sheathless. Inflorescences spicate, 3-20 cm, with 2-7 heads, basally interrupted, apically subcontiguous; heads sessile, globose, 1-1.5 cm in diam. Spikelets narrowly ovoid, 6-7 mm, weakly laterally compressed, 1-flowered, base contracted, apex acuminate. Glumes 5 or 6; basal 3 or 4 grayish brown, ovate, much smaller than others, membranous, 1-veined, apex acute; apical 2 glumes lanceolate-ovate. Perianth bristles 6, filiform, 3.5-4.5 mm, ca. 2 × as long as nutlet, flexuose, smooth. Stamens 3; anthers ca. 2 mm. Style slender; stigmas 2. Nutlet dark brown, obovoid to broadly obovoid, 2-2.3 mm, biconvex, indistinctly transversely wrinkled, shiny, base attenuate; persistent style base narrowly conic-subulate, 4-5 mm, glabrous. Fl. and fr. Sep-Oct.
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