Carex mitchelliana M.A. Curtis

Mitchell's Sedge

Herb

Perennial

Vascular

Mitchell's Sedge is a native herbaceous perennial in the Sedge family (Cyperaceae). It is found in a few widely scattered locations in Alabama. Mitchell's Sedge occurs in swampy woods, in wet meadows, along the edges of streams and ponds, and in roadside ditches. It is a perennial from a rhizome, forming small clumps of stems. The stems are 3-angled and scabrous. Leaves are linear, green in color, glabrous above, and papillose below. The leaf sheaths are reddish brown in color. Flowers are produced in spikes. There are 2-4 drooping pistillate spikes which often have some staminate florets at their apex and are yellowish-brown in color, and 1-2 staminate spikes that are terminal. The pistillate scales are truncate at their apex and have a scabrous awn. The perigynia are scarcely inflated and loosely enclose the achene. They are papillose over their entire surface. The achenes are not constricted. Mitchell's Sedge is similar to Fringed Sedge (Carex crinita Lamarck), and has been treated as a variety of that species. Fringed Sedge differs by having glabrous leaf sheaths and perigynia with papillae not covering the entire surface. Less than 100 populations of Mitchell's Sedge are known from Massachusetts and New York, south to Mississippi along the Coastal Plain.—A. Diamond

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Native FACW+ (NWPL)

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