THE GENUS CAREX IN CALIFORNIA 



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8. C. pansa Bailey. (Fig. 5.) Culms arising singly, 1.5-3 dm. high, tri- 

 angular, roughened above; leaf-blades 1-3 mm. wide; head 1.5-2.5 cm. long, the 

 spikes lance-ovoid, 7-8 mm. long, 5 mm. wide, the several to many perigynia ap- 

 pressed; scales with conspicuous white hyaline 



margins, concealing perigynia; perigynia 1.5-2 

 mm. wide, lanceolate-elliptic, nerveless ventrally, 

 tapering at base and at apex, the beak 1 mm. 

 long, obliquely cut dorsally, serrulate. 



Type Locality: Clatsop, Oregon, and 

 Ilwaco, Washington (Henderson). 



Drifting sands along the seacoast from 

 Monterey Co., California, north to southwestern 

 Washington. 



Locs.: Pacific Grove, Olsson-Seffer; Seaside, 

 Monterey Co., Alice D. Randall 251; Asilomar, Monterey 

 Co., Parish 11475; San Francisco, Olsson-Seffer; Eureka, 

 Davy & Blasdale 6218, Tracy 3258; Lake Earle, Del Norte 

 Co., Davy; Crescent City, Dudley. 



Ref.: Carex pansa Bailey, Bot. Gaz. 13: 82 

 (1888). 



9. C. praegracilis W. Boott. Culms 2-5 

 dm. high; leaf-blades 1.5-3 mm. wide, flattened 

 or canaliculate; head linear-oblong to oblong- 

 ovoid, 1-5 cm. long, 6-12 mm. wide, the 5-15 

 spikes densely aggregated, androgynous, with 4- 

 10 perigynia; scales ovate-lanceolate, acute to 

 cuspidate, nearly concealing the perigynia, light- 

 brownish with hyaline margins; perigynia 3-4 

 mm. long, 1.5 mm. wide, dark-brown at matur- 

 ity, nerved on the outer, nearly nerveless on the 

 inner face, obliquely cut dorsally. 



Type Locality: San Diego, California 

 (Miss Scott). 



Meadows, widely distributed and variable, 

 Manitoba, Iowa and Kansas to Yukon, British 

 Columbia, California and central Mexico. Widely 

 distributed in California except on the higher 

 mountains. 



The species was founded on slender desic- 

 cated specimens, and the original description of 

 the leaf-blades as thread-like and convolute is 

 apparently based on some broken-off culms; 

 some ordinary flattened leaf-blades are however 

 present. The species has also been much con- 

 fused in California with Carex siccata Dewey. 

 This widely distributed species, of which I have 

 seen no specimens from California, has sharply 

 bidentate perigynia. All California material so 

 named, belongs to C. praegracilis. Flowering 

 specimens of this species present a markedly 

 different aspect from mature fruiting specimens, 

 and even in the latter case specimens in which 

 the perigynia are numerous give a different first 

 impression than those in which the staminate 

 flowers predominate. 



Fig. 5. 



Carex pansa Bailey. 



a, habit, X 2 h\ b, scale, X 5; c, peri- 

 gynium, X 5. 



