General: Perennial, tufted herb from short rhizomes; stems 15-80 cm tall, much exceeding the leaves.
Leaves: Sheaths reddish towards the bases; blades flat, 2-5 mm wide, the lower ones not much reduced.
Flowers: Terminal spike with both female and male flowers, the female ones towards the tips, the lateral spikes female, short-stalked and upright to spreading, 1-2.5 cm long; bracts subtending the spikes short- sheathing, leaflike, about equalling the spikes.
Fruits: Perigynia elliptical, 2.7-3.5 mm long, 1.2-2 mm wide, straw-coloured often with greenish margins, nerveless and pimpled, the beaks short, less than 0.4 mm long; female scales broadly lanceolate, shorter than and about as wide as the perigynia, reddish-black, roughly pimpled, with short-pointed tips; stigmas 3; achenes 3-angled, egg-shaped, granular, 1.2-1.4 mm long.
Moist to mesic slopes, meadows and thickets in the subalpine and alpine zones; common in BC in and east of the Coast-Cascade Mountains; N to AK, YT and NT, E to SW AB and S to CO, UT, ID and OR.
The table below shows the species-specific information calculated from original data (BEC database) provided by the BC Ministry of Forests and Range. (Updated August, 2013)
