Montana Field Guide

Short-rhizomatous. Stems erect, 20–60 cm, loosely tufted. Leaves basal and cauline; basal leaves sometimes bladeless; cauline blades 3–6 mm wide. Inflorescence of 3 to 6 overlapping spikes; lowest bract shorter than the inflorescence. Spikes: uppermost male 1–2 cm long; lower female, pedunculate, ascending, 1–3 cm long, ovoid to cylindric; lowest sometimes arching. Perigynia ascending, green and purplish, glabrous, flattened, narrowly elliptic, 3.5–4.5 × 1.5–2 mm with a distinct beak ca. 0.5 mm long; stigmas 3. Female scales lanceolate, acuminate, blackish with a pale midvein sometime prolonged into an awn tip, as wide and ca. as long as the perigynia. Achene 3-sided, smaller than the perigynium (Lesica et al. 2012. Manual of Montana Vascular Plants. BRIT Press. Fort Worth, TX).

Moist to wet meadows, turf, forest openings; subalpine, rarely alpine (Lesica et al. 2012. Manual of Montana Vascular Plants. BRIT Press. Fort Worth, TX).