Montana Field Guide

Plants loosely cespitose. Leaf blades 3-6 mm wide, sheath front purple-dotted. Inflorescence more or less dense, generally dark purple; lowest internode 5-45 mm long; lateral spikelet 8-30 mm long, 4-6 mm wide, generally erect, stalk 0-15 mm long, tip generally pistillate; lowest spikelet bract < 1/2 length of inflorescencve, more or less like pistillate floral bract; pistillate floral bract obtuse to acute. Fruit: Perigynia 8-50 per spikelet, ascending to spreading, 2-4 mm, 1.2-2.3 mm wide, unveined, papillate, generally purle above, beak 0.1-0.3 mm, glabrous, tip notched < 0.1 mm; fruit 1.2-1.9 mm long, 0.9-1.5 mm wide, dull (Mastrogiuseppe, 1993, in The Jepson Manual).

Wet or moist meadows and shores of streams and lakes, moderate elevations in mosit mountains (Cronquist, 1964, Vasc. Pl. Pac. Northwest).