Some Sedges (Carex) Never Found in Oregon 
Peter Zika 
Department of Botany, Box 355325, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195-5325 
Keli Kuykendall 
Carex Working Group, Herbarium, Dept. Botany & Plant Pathology, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR 97331 
T he Carex Working Group has focused on the distribu¬ 
tion and taxonomy of Oregon sedges (Carex) since 1992. 
In 1993 we produced a Preliminary Atlas, showing maps 
with county records for each Carex, based on existing collec¬ 
tions in museums and a few literature reports. At the time we 
knew there were misidentified specimens, and thus some distri¬ 
bution records were errors. In the process of revising the atlas, 
we annotated and databased approximately 6000 dried collec¬ 
tions in Corvallis (mostly loans, donations, and materials at the 
herbaria ORE, OSC and WILLU). The Carex Working Group 
also went afield and into the greenhouse to fill gaps in our knowl¬ 
edge (Tipton 1996). The result is a new Atlas of Oregon Carex 
(Wilson et al. 1999). A handful of Carex species in our Prelimi¬ 
nary Atlas were not included in the 1999 Atlas, as none had an 
herbarium voucher. Our attempts to substantiate literature re¬ 
ports led us to a trail of lost specimens, obscure synonymy, and 
misidentifications. Below we review the evidence for and against 
the "Oregon citizenship" of each of these plants. Authors and 
taxonomy generally follow the most recent references (e.g., 
Kartesz 1994, Mastrogiuseppe 1993, Cronquist et al. 1977, 
Hitchcock and Cronquist 1973), with exceptions noted. The 
discussion of each sedge includes modern ideas of where the 
plant occurs, journals or floras that credited them to Oregon, 
and reidentifications of voucher collections, citing relevant her¬ 
baria. Acronyms for herbaria are standard (Holmgren et al. 1990), 
or are explained in the acknowledgments. 
Carex albonigra Mack, is an alpine sedge ranging from 
California to Alaska and east to Colorado. Carex Working Group 
100 km 
(1993) tentatively included C. albonigra in a list of rare Oregon 
sedges, based on Peck (1961) reporting it from "high moun¬ 
tains of eastern Oregon." Investigating further, we found nei¬ 
ther a Peck voucher collection, nor any map data in Peck's pri¬ 
vate geographic card file (at OSC) to indicate he saw an Oregon 
collection. Apparently Peck placed a number of species in his 
Oregon flora as speculation. For example, he reported Subularia 
aquatica, which was documented with specimens from adja¬ 
cent states, but was never collected in Oregon. Similarly, it seems 
that Peck was predicting C. albonigra would be found in Or¬ 
egon one day. Unfortunately he never mentioned in his flora 
which species were documented with vouchers and which were 
not. What Peck (1941, 1961) said was: 
With relatively few exceptions, the descriptions of species 
[in his Flora of Oregon] have been drawn directly from 
specimens in hand that have been collected wholly or in 
part within our own territory. When the collections were 
from outside the state, we admitted the species only on 
what we considered very reliable authority. 
Murray (1969) studied C. albonigra and its relatives, yet never 
found an Oregon specimen. The Carex Working Group found 
vouchers from no closer than Custer Co., Idaho (Brainerd et al. 
1995), and we are excluding the species from our flora. 
Carex brevior (Dew.) Mack, has been collected in north¬ 
eastern Washington and southeastern British Columbia, but 
generally is known from east of the continental divide, and is 
widespread in eastern North America. Ireland (1968) reported 
100 km 
Range maps of C. ladocarpa var. americana (L) and C. pellita (R) in Oregon (from Wilson et al. 1999). 
22 
Kalmiopsis Volume 7, 2001 
