CYPERACEAE SEDGE FAMILY 
BUR SEDGE 
Carex Grayii Carey 
The Sedge family is a very large family of grass- 
like plants, but except for those members which are 
used ornamentally, it is of little economic importance. 
The family includes 
the Bulrushes, Cot- 
ton Grass, Umbrella 
Plantandafewothers, 
but primarily the true 
Sedges, which, with 
about 100 species oc- \ 
curring in Illinois, far 
outstrip all other 
genera in number of 
representatives in the 
state. 
Though often mistaken for 
Grasses, the Sedges may usu- 
ally be distinguished by their 
solid instead of hollow stems, 
and the leaf sheath margins 
which do not overlap but grow 
together into a tube around 
the stem. Also, the stems are 
usually, though not always, 
triangular, and the leaves are 
in 3 rows instead of 2. 
The Bur Sedge grows in wet woods and meadows 
from western New England and Ontario to Iowa 
and Missouri, and may be found from June to 
September. The flowers are imperfect and always 
in some form of spike. Each staminate flower 
usually has 3 stamens, and each pistillate flower a 
single pistil. The fruit is an akene, enclosed by a much inflated 
ovoid organ peculiar to the genus and called the perigynium. 
In this species it is smooth or downy, slightly more than one- 
quarter inch in diameter above the base, and tapers to a sharp 
2-toothed beak. It is usually necessary to examine the mature 
fruit to determine Carex species with certainty. 
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