58 FLOWERS OF THE BOGS AND MARSHES 



clumps in wet places or by the sides of rivers, in damp woods, and also 

 in marshes, amongst other common types, such as the Great Prickly 

 Sedge and others. 



It has a clustered, bushy habit, with 3-sided stems, which are 

 leafy and stout, rough above. The root is densely aggregated 

 together, forming a tufted surface. The leaves are rough, long, 

 and flat. 



The spikelets of the flowers are in a panicle with wide branches, 

 the sterile male flowers at the top. The panicle is three times com- 

 pound. The fruit is broad, egg-shaped, coming to a sharp point, 

 swollen below, with nerved perigynia, the beak deeply cleft, and the 

 glumes margined. Hummock Sedge is 3 ft. in height. The flowers 

 expand in June and July. The plant is a perennial, propagated by 

 suckers. 



The spikelets are bisexual, and male at the top only; the base 

 of the style is swollen. The bisexual flowers are proterogynous, 

 the stigma ripening first, and are pollinated by the agency of the 

 wind. 



The fruit is a nut, which falls when ripe into the water or upon 

 the ground. 



Like other sedges this is a peat-loving plant, growing in a peat 

 soil. 



Two beetles, Cercus pedicular ius, C. bipustulatus, and a moth, 

 Elachista paludum, are found on it. 



In bogs it forms solid patches which serve as stepping-stones do on 

 moist ground. 



ESSENTIAL SPECIFIC CHARACTERS: 



326. Carex paniculata, L. Stem thick, triquetrous, with many long, 

 rough, tufted leaves, spikes in a panicle, pale-brown, fruit many-veined, 

 bracts setaceous, nut ovoid. 



Great Prickly Sedge (Carex vulpina, L.) 



This common sedge is found throughout the N. Temperate Zone 

 in Europe, N. Africa, Siberia, and N. America. It is not known in 

 any early deposits. In Great Britain it does not grow in Cardigan, 

 Isle of Man, Dumfries, Kirkcudbright, Roxburgh, Stirling, Mid and 

 N. Perth, Easterness, Westerness, Main Argyle, E. Ross, E. Suther- 

 land, Caithness, Orkneys, Shetlands, but elsewhere generally, and in 

 Ireland and the Channel Islands. 



The Great Prickly Sedge is a common object wherever damp 



