CYPERACEAE (SEDGE FAMILY) 91 



Spikes oblong or long-cylindrical. 



Perigynium ovate, green or brown-purple .... 27, 28, 29, 31, 32 



Perigynium obovate, yellow or whitish . . . . . . .14 



Stigmas three. 



Perigynium hairy. 



Pistillate spikes few-flowered, almost globular, mostly sessile. 



Scales ciliate ............ 4 



Scales not ciliate. 



Spikes greenish; culms slender ........ 6a, 66 



Spikes colored ............ 5 



Pistillate spikes several to many-flowered, oblong or cylindrical. 



Perigynium conspicuously nerved . . . . . . . . .19 



Perigynium nerveless or nearly so. 



Plant hairy throughout . . . . . . . . . .13 



Plant smooth ............ 18 



Perigynium smooth. 



Pistillate spikes pendulous or nodding. 



Beak slender, longer than body of perigynium; spikes greenish- white . .17 

 Body of perigynium as long or longer than beak. 

 Spikes small, 6 or fewer-flowered; plant delicate . . . . .15 



Spikes oblong, pendulous, dark ........ 35 



Spikes thick and long; perigynium inflated. 



Perigynium greenish straw-colored, slender-beaked, conspicuously more 



than 10-nerved 20 



Perigynium straw-colored or often purplish. 



More or less ascending 22, 23 



Conspicuously squarrose ......... 24 



Spikes all erect. 



Short-oblong, densely flowered. 



Beak short, stout, truncate .........13 



Beak longer than body 17 



Cylindrical; perigynium beaked. 



Perigynium lanceolate, flattened . . . . . . . .16 



Perigynium thin, inflated, straw-colored or purple. 



More or less ascending ........ 22, 23 



Conspicuously squarrose ......... 24 



SUBGENUS I. Eucarex. Staminate flowers forming one or more terminal 

 linear or club-shaped spikes which are often pistillate at base or apex, or occa- 

 sionally having a few pistillate flowers intermixed. Pistillate flowers usually 

 in distinct and normally simple mostly peduncled spikes which are seldom 

 aggregated into heads. Cross-section of the perigynium circular or obtusely 

 angular in outline. Style commonly 3-parted and the achenium trigonous or 

 triquetrous. 



1. Spike single (in our species), androgynous, staminate at the top, the rhachis 

 conspicuously jointed: perigynium lanceolate or spindle-shaped, longer than 

 the scale, de flexed at maturity: stigmas very rarely two. DEFLEXOCARPAE. 

 Low and mostly slender species. 



* Perigynium brown, spindle-shaped or narrowly ovate, stipitate, little longer 

 than the scale. PUBLICARES Tuckm. 



1. Carex pyrenaica Wahl. Vet. Akad. Nya Handl. Stockh. 24: 139. 1803. 

 Culms 5-15 cm. high, slender: spike dense, oblong, brown or purple, the fertile 

 flowers erect until full maturity: leaves narrow, mostly involute-filiform, 

 shorter than the culms: staminate flowers few, occupying one third or less the 

 length of the spike: perigynium few-nerved or nerveless, usually shining at 

 maturity. High mountains of Colorado, Utah, and northward. 



2. Carex nigricans C. A. Mey. Mem. Acad. St. Petersb. 1: 210. t. 7. 1831. 

 Stouter: leaves nearly flat, 2 mm. broad: staminate flowers usually con- 

 spicuous and occupying about half the spike: perigynium somewhat ventricose, 

 dull: otherwise as in the last, with which it grows. Evidently the more com- 

 mon species. 



2. Spikes one or more: staminate spike always single, usually distinct, sessile 

 or nearly so, sometimes androgynous with all the pistillate flowers borne at 

 its base: pistillate spikes, if any, small and globular, mostly sessile, more or 

 less approximate: bracts short or none, sheathless: perigynium ovate or glob- 

 ular, hirsute (thin and scabrous in No. 3), tightly surrounding the ache- 



