Scirpus L.

Annual or perennial herbs of very various habit, stonoliferous or cespitose, glabrous or only minutely hairy in the inflorescence. Stems erect or procumbent, sometimes floating or submerged, terete to acutely angled, usually smooth. Leaves either with more or less developed blades, or reduced to bladeless sheaths; ligule membranous or wanting. Inflorescence terminal, but often pseudolateral, capitate or anthelate, or consisting of a single spikelet. Involucral bracts 1-several, in pseudolateral inflorescences seemingly a continuation of the stem, in 1-spiculate inflorescences usually reduced and glume-like. Spikelets solitary or clustered, terete or angular, usually many-flowered. Rachilla persistent, not winged. Glumes spirally arranged, acropetally caducous, the lower 1-3 often empty. Flowers hermaphrodite, the upper ones often tabescent. Perianth consisting of 1-6(-11) setaceous (rarely flattened, scale-like) bristles, not rarely absent. Stamens 1-3; anthers linear or oblong, with shortly produced, smooth or bristly connective. Style caducous, continuous with the ovary (neither separated by a constriction nor different in texture, but passing insensibly into the top of the ovary), glabrous or very rarely sparsely fimbriate, hardly or not dilated at the base; stigmas 2-3. Nut 2-or 3-sided, obovate or elliptic to oblong in outline, often apiculate, smooth or rugulose; epidermal cells hexangular or vertically oblong to linear.

Most species prefer open, wet localities: swamps, pools, ditches, wet rice-fields, lake-shores, and stream banks; S. confervoides grows always, S.fluitans often submerged. In Malesia prolificating inflorescences have been observed in S. mucronatus, S. inundatus, and S. subtilissimus.

Uses. Only a few species have some economic importance. The stems of S. grossus and S. mucronatus are often used for making cheap but durable mats and bags; S.juncoides is sometimes used as a green food for cattle.