Carex. | CYPERACEAE. 275 
turgid, unequally biconvex or obscurely trigonous, dark red-brown or 
purplish-black, rarely pale-brown, narrowed into a short sharply bidentate 
beak ; margins smooth or serrate above. Styles 3. Nut ovoid, trigonous.— 
Ill. Car, i (1858) 61, t. 175; Cheesem. Man. N.Z. Fl. (1906) 832. 
C. dissita var. Neesiana Kukenth. in Pflanzenr. Heft 38 (1909) 691. 
C. Neesiana Hook. f. Handb. N.Z. Fl. (1864) 316; Cheesem. an Trans. N.Z. 
Inst. xvi (1884) 438 (not of Endl.). 
NortH AnD SoutH Isutanps, Stewart IstanpD: Not uncommon from Ahipara 
and Mangonui southwards, usually in woods. Sea-level to 2000 ft. October— 
January. i wean & So -4G + 2 Bt y 
Reduced to ©. dissita by Kukenthal, as var. Solandri. No doubt there are 
transition states between the two plants—in the river valleys of north-west Nelson, 
for instance, where C. Solandri is particularly abundant, such may be commonly 
observed. But what I take to be the typical form is a much larger and more slender 
plant, with longer culms (sometimes over 5 ft. in length) that are often prostrate in 
fruit. The male spikelets (which are seldom more than one in C. dissita) are often as 
many as four or five; and the lower female spikelets are usually compound, with long 
nodding peduncles. These characters recede so much from the ordinary state of 
C. dissita that I cannot refuse to regard the two plants as distinct. 
43. @. ventosa C. B. Clarke in Cheesem. Man. N.Z. Fl. (1906) 832.— 
Culms tall, robust, trigonous, 18in. high, leafy at the base. Leaves 
equalling the culms or shorter than them, pale-green, smooth and glabrous, 
striate, flat, 4 1in. Bron, sheathing at the base. Inflorescence 12-14 in. 
long; spikelets 6-8, 2-3 in. long, pale; terminal 2-3 male, slender, apo 
mate ; fore eae all eabele: erect, on long peduncles varying from 14-3 in. 
Utricles about in. long, elliptic- oblong, trigonous, narrowed ats both 
ends, 12-nerved, stramineous; beak short, Nut elliptic-oblong, trigonous, 
black.—C. B. Clarke in Kew Bulletin Additional Series, xiii (1908) 83. 
CuatTHam Istanps: A. H. Travers, W. R. B. Oliver ! 
I have not seen authenticated specimens of this plant. Mr. C. B. Clarke, who 
communicated to me the brief notes upon which the above diagnosis has béen based, 
considered that it should be placed in the vicinity of the Norfolk Island C. Neesiana ; 
from which, however, it is removed by the larger and narrower utricle. For the 
present, I have associated with it a plant collected on the Chatham Islands by 
Mr. W. R. B. Oliver, specimens of which have been kindly lent to me by Mr. Petrie. 
44, C. longiculmis Petrze on Bape N.Z. Inst. xiv (1882) 363.—Tall, 
densely tufted. Culms terete or nearly so, smooth, 2—3 ft. high or more, 
leafy at the base. Leaves Bhd than the culms or equalling them, pale- 
green, sheathing at the base, $ at or keeled, striate; margins 
slightly scabrid above. Soikelcte 5-7, the lowermost usually distant, “the 
remainder approximate ; terminal one male, slender, 1-2 in. long, sometimes 
with a smaller one near its base ; remainder all female, usually with a few 
male flowers at the base, rarely ‘at the top, very large and stout, #-14 in. 
long, 4-4 in. broad, pale-brown, sessile or the lowest shortly peduncled ; 
bracts leafy, far exceeding the inflorescence. Glumes broadly ovate, 
membranous, pale chestnut-brown, midrib produced into a stout hispid 
awn.  Utricle equalling the glumes, somewhat stipitate, ovoid, biconvex, 
nerved, pale- or dark-brown, suddenly contracted into a rather long and 
stout bidentate beak; margins smooth. Styles 3. Nut trigonous. — 
Cheesem. in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xvi (1884) 488; Man. N.Z. FI. (1906) 832 ; 
Kukenth. in Pflanzenr. Heft 38 (1909) 692. 
Stewart IstaAnD: Paterson’s Inlet, Petrie! Thomson! Glory Cove, T. Kirk! 
A very distinct species, perhaps nearest to C. litorosa, but much larger in all its parts. 
? 
