General: Perennial, densely tufted herb from smooth, fibrous roots; stems slender, wiry, more or less circular in cross-section, tapered, 5-40 cm tall, more often surpassing or sometimes shorter than the leaves.
Leaves: Numerous; basal sheaths brownish to dark brown, persistent and conspicuous, densely-packed, shredded, generally lacking blades; blades very slender and wiry, flat to folded or in-rolled, mostly 0.3-0.6 mm wide.
Flowers: Inflorescence a solitary, terminal, erect, slender, 1- to 3-cm long, 2- to 3-mm wide spike, the spikelets each with 1 male and 1 female flower, the male flower above the female flower; involucral bracts solitary, scalelike or short and leafy.
Fruits: Scales 2.5-3.5 mm long, brown, the margins broadly translucent, sometimes rough, otherwise smooth; stigmas 2 or 3; achenes compressed, 3-angled, 1.5-3 mm long.
Mesic to dry meadows, rock outcrops and ridges in the montane to alpine zones; frequent in BC in and E of the Coast-Cascade Mountains; circumpolar, N to AK, YT and NT, E to Labr. and S to NM, UT and CA; Eurasia.
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)
