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Carex aestivalis M.A.Curtis ex A.Gray  

No occurrences found

Family: Cyperaceae
summer sedge
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  • FNA
  • Gleason & Cronquist
  • Resources
Peter W. Ball & A. A. Reznicek in Flora of North America (vol. 23)
Plants densely cespitose. Culms dark maroon at base; flowering stems 25-60 cm, usually longer than leaves at maturity, 0.5-0.7 mm thick, glabrous or sparsely pubescent, finely scabrous within inflorescence. Leaves: basal sheaths maroon, bladeless, pubescent; others grading from maroon to green on back, pale brown-hyaline, red dotted and usually pubescent on front; blades flat, 1.5-3 mm wide, glabrous or sparsely pubescent on both surfaces, especially near sheath, finely scabrous on margins. Inflorescences: peduncles of lateraal spikes 5-25 mm, shorter than spikes, glabrous; peduncle of terminal spike 5-25 mm, glabrous; proximal bracts often equaling or exceeding inflorescences; sheaths to 9 mm; blades 1-2 mm wide. Lateral spikes 2-4, 1 per node, well separated, erect or arching, pistillate with 15-30 perigynia attached 1 mm apart distally and 3 mm apart proximally, linear, 15-50 × 3-3.5 mm. Terminal spike gynecandrous, 20-35 × 1.5-3.5 mm. Pistillate scales pale hyaline, tinged with golden or reddish brown, with broad green midrib, red dotted, oblong-elliptic, shorter than mature perigynia, apex obtuse to cuspidate, glabrous. Perigynia green, copiously red dotted, 2-ribbed and finely 12-15-veined, loosely enveloping achene, ovoid-ellipsoid, 2-3.2 × 0.8-1 mm, membranous, base with short stipe, gradually tapering to acute beakless apex, glabrous. Achenes distinctly stipitate, 1.8-2.1 × 0.8-1 mm, stipe 0.5 mm. 2n = 56. Fruiting summer . Dry to mesic forests, seepage slopes, and meadows in the mountains; to 1600 m; Ala., Ga., Ky., Md., N.Y., N.C., Pa., S.C., Tenn., Vt., Va., W.Va. Variants of Carex aestivalis with larger perigynia have been collected from Virginia and North Carolina. Carex aestivalis apparently hybridizes with C. gracillima and C. virescens.

Vascular plants of NE US and adjacent Canada
Tufted, 3-7 dm, ±purplish at base; main lvs 2-3 mm wide, usually hairy; sheaths hairy, at least on the ventral strip; terminal spike pistillate in the distal half; lateral spikes 2-4, pistillate, usually approximate and overlapping, cylindric, 2-4 cm נ2-3 mm, erect or nearly so, the lower on peduncles to 2 cm, the upper subsessile; upper bracts sheathless or nearly so; pistillate scales oval to obovate, half as long as the perigynium, obtuse or short-cuspidate; perigynia narrowly ellipsoid, 2.6-3.5 mm, a third as wide, obscurely several-nerved, tapering to an obtuse beakless tip; achene concavely trigonous. Woods, especially in the mts.; N.H. and Vt. to N.C., Ky., Ga., and Ala.

Gleason, Henry A. & Cronquist, Arthur J. 1991. Manual of vascular plants of northeastern United States and adjacent Canada. lxxv + 910 pp.

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