禾叶嵩草 he ye song cao

Rhizomes short. Basal sheaths prominent and persistent, pale brown or yellowish brown, dull or slightly shiny, margins and apices fibrillose, not or retaining a few dried leaf blades. Culms densely tufted, erect and rigid, obscurely trigonous, (7-)20-45 cm tall, 1-1.5 mm in diam. Leaves basal, shorter to longer than culms; blade semicircular or V-shaped in transverse section, 0.5-1.5 mm wide, midrib not usually distinct abaxially. Inflorescence ± densely spicate, usually unisexual (sometimes androgynous or gynaecandrous), male and female spikes borne on same plant. Male inflorescence narrowly cylindric or narrowly ellipsoid, 1.5-3(-5) × 0.3-0.6 cm; male glumes narrowly oblong, 6-8(-10) × 1-2 mm, margin narrowly hyaline, apex rounded. Female inflorescence brown, narrowly cylindric, 2.5-7.5 × 0.3-0.6 cm, lower spikelets distant; lowest involucral bract glumelike, apex acute or shortly aristate; female glumes brown, with paler midvein, oblong-ovate or narrowly triangular-ovate, 5-6 × 1.5-2 mm, midvein narrow, margin very narrowly hyaline, apex acute or obtuse. Prophylls lower part pale green, apex brown, narrowly oblong-elliptic, 4-6 × 0.8-1.8 mm, papery, 2-keeled, keels scabrid, margins free to base or fused in lower 1/4, not overlapping, apex truncate or notched. Nutlets narrowly elliptic or oblanceolate, trigonous, very shortly stipitate and shortly beaked, 3.5-5.5 (including stipe and beak) × 0.8-1.5 mm. Stigmas 3. Sterile rachilla of female spikelets 1.2-2 mm, less than 1/2 length of nutlet. Fl. and fr. Jun-Sep.

Grassy slopes, among shrubs, on mossy rocks, alpine meadows; 3100-4700 m. Gansu, Qinghai, Shaanxi, Sichuan, Xizang, Yunnan [Nepal].

This is possibly a form of Kobresia cercostachys, which it resembles (especially in its fibrillose leaf sheaths and somewhat intermediate leaf morphology) but differs from in its (usually) contrasting female and male spikes.