GLUMACE^ 391 



In the Highlands it ascends above 1000 ft. It 

 occurs in Ireland and the Channel Islands. 



Turfy bogs, marshes in the neighbourhood of the 

 sea or wet regions, wet moors, are the habitats of the 

 Black Beak-rush, as the plant is also called. It is 

 found on sandy soil in the heath association, on wet 

 heaths, being abundant on the Cornish heaths, in 

 valley moors, in the Blue Moor grass association, and 

 in the White Beak Sedge association. 



Tufted in habit. Black Beak Sedge has a short, 

 stout, branched rootstock, with strong black fibres. 

 The stems are stiff, rush-like, round in section, naked, 

 the leaves and sheaths forming matted tufts, dense 

 and hard, wiry, leafless above. There are numerous, 

 reddish-brown or black, smooth, shining sheaths, 

 some ending in erect leaves, not so long as the stem. 

 The leaves are radical, stiff, wiry, round in section, 

 with the margins convolute. 



The flowers are terminal, rounded, inversely ovoid, 

 the spikes dark, reddish-brown and shining, with 

 bristle-like bracts, longer than the spike. 



There are several dark brown, shining spikelets 

 (five to ten), erect, stalkless, linear to oblong. The 

 glumes are pointed, with a roughish, prominent keel 

 on the edge, roughly in two opposite rows, oblong to 

 lance-shaped, somewhat acute, the four upper with 

 flowers in the axils, the short lower ones empty. 

 The bristles are barbed with one spine upward and 

 short. There are three stigmas. 



In height the Bog-rush varies from 6 in. to 2 ft. 



