Biorepository Data Portal

Herbs, perennial, cespitose, pale to olive green or occasionally bronze when dry, to 4.7 dm, not glaucous; rhizomes scarcely discernable. Stems simple or branched, with 1 node, 1.1-1.9 dm wide, glabrous, margins entire, usually same color and texture as stem body but occasionally drying lighter; internode 17.2-21.3 cm, equaling or shorter than leaves, with 2 branches. Leaf blades glabrous, bases not persistent in fibrous tufts. Inflorescences borne singly; spathes green, obviously wider than supporting branch, glabrous, keels entire; outer 13-19.6 mm on branched stems, 19.3-25.6 mm on simple stems, 1.2 mm longer to 2 mm shorter than inner on branched stems, 1.5-4.2 mm longer than inner on simple stems, tapering evenly towards apex, margins basally connate 3.9-6.1 mm; inner with keel evenly curved, hyaline margins 0.2-0.5 mm wide, apex acuminate to acute, ending 0.2-0.8 mm proximal to green apex on branched stems, sometimes lobed and exceeding green apex on simple stems. Flowers: tepals light blue, bases yellow; outer tepals 5-13 mm, apex rounded, short-aristate; filaments connate ± entirely, stipitate-glandular basally; ovary similar in color to foliage. Capsules light to dark brown, ± globose to ± fusiform, 5-7 mm; pedicel usually erect. Seeds globose to obconic, occasionally with slight depression, 1-1.3 mm, rugulose. 2n = 96. Flowering spring--early summer. Meadows or swales within stabilized coastal dunes, sandy river banks inland; 0--200 m; La., Tex.; adjacent coastal n Mexico.