CYPERACEAE (SEDGE FAMILY) 101 



gid, flat on the inner face, marginless and nerveless, dull brown, beak entire or 

 nearly so, as long as or longer than the thin hyaline scale. Wyoming to the 

 plains of the Saskatchewan. 



H- - Spikes several to many-flowered, aggregated into a globular or oblong head. 



44. Carex gravida Bailey, Mem. Torr. Club 1: 5. 1889. Light green: culms 

 4-9 dm. tall, 3-angled, rough above: leaves flat, 3-6 mm. wide: bracts usually 

 very short: spikes several, in a dense heavy head 2-3.5 cm. long, pale, sub- 

 globose: perigynia flat, broadly ovate or suborbicular, 3-4 mm. long, rounded 

 at the base, narrowed into a 2-toothed beak about one third as long as the 

 body, several-nerved on the outer face or nerveless: scales acute, cuspidate or 

 short-awned, about as long as the perigynia. C. cephaloidea. Possibly coming 

 into our eastern border. 



* * * Spikes tawny or brown, somewhat chaffy in appearance, closely aggregated 

 or densely capitate: perigynium ovate or ovate-lanceolate, not conspicuously 

 nerved. FOETIDAE Tuckm. 



-t Perigynium conspicuously rough on the angles above. 



45. Carex Hoodii Boott, Hook. Fl. Bor. Am. 2: 211. t. 211. 1840. Tall and 

 slender, but erect, the culm 3-6 dm. high, prolonged beyond the leaves: spikes 

 several to many, very few-flowered, compacted into an ovoid or oblong head 

 1-2 cm. long: perigynium spreading, small and narrow, gradually contracted at 

 both ends, green, nerveless or nearly so, conspicuously wing-margined, rough 

 on the angles, about the length of the brown or tawny scale. C. muricata con- 

 fixa. Colorado to Montana and west to Washington. 



46. Carex occidentalis Bailey, 1. c. Glaucous: leaves narrower than in the 

 last, and relatively longer: spikes more or less aggregated into a very slender 

 head 2-3 cm. long, the lowest one or two usually wholly distinct: bracts scale- 

 like, inconspicuous: perigynium larger than in the last, turgid-ovate, abruptly 

 short-beaked, nearly marginless and often smooth: scales muticous. C. 

 muricata. Colorado to Montana. 



47. Carex Hookeriana Dewey, Am. Journ. Sci. 29: 248. 1836. Very slender: 

 head interrupted, castaneous, . small, the spikes sometimes alternately ar- 

 ranged: bracts of the two or three lower spikes produced into long awns, which 

 surpass the spikes: perigynium small, green, usually lightly nerved, gradually 

 produced into a beak which is cut into sharp awl-like teeth. C. muricata 

 gracilis. Colorado to California. 



+- -t- Perigynium smooth or slightly scabrous. 



48. Carex foetida All. Fl. Fed. 2: 265. 1785. Creeping: culm 1-4 dm. high, 

 rather stout, scabrous, longer than the long-pointed leaves: spikes very densely 

 aggregated into a globose or ovoid brown head: perigynium lanceolate or 

 ovate-lanceolate, toothed at the apex, about the length of the acute or mu- 

 cronate brown scale. Mountains; Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming. 



49. Carex incurva Lightf. Fl. Scot. 544. 1777. Extensively creeping: culm 

 stiff and short, 3-15 cm. long, smooth, usually curved, about the length of the 

 narrow and stiff curved leaves: spikes 2-5, crowded into a short ovoid or 

 globular brown or tawny head which is only 3-15 mm. long: perigynium large 

 and turgid, stipitate, broadly ovate, conical above, purple towards the top, 

 faintly many-nerved on one side at least, narrowed into a short and stout en- 

 tire beak, not covered by the acute, thin scale. Colorado and far into British 

 America. 



50. Carex stenophylla Wahl. Kongl. Acad. Handl. II. 24: 142. 1803. Sto- 

 loniferous: culms stiff, 3-15 cm. high from a mass of fibrillose sheaths, usu- 

 ally longer than the stiff involute filiform leaves: spikes 3-6, short, 4-8 mm. 

 long, nearly globose, loosely conglomerated into a small subglobose or shortly 

 oblong head, each spike subtended by a scarious mucronate bract of less than 

 its own length: perigynium ovate, brown, nerved, gradually contracted into a 

 short, blunt, entire beak, tightly inclosing the achenlum, at maturity longer 



