台中薹草 tai zhong tai cao

Rhizome with slender stolons. Culms laxly tufted, 10-15 cm tall, slightly triquetrous, smooth, clothed with few bladeless sheaths at base. Leaves nearly basal, shorter than culm, blades 2-3 mm wide, soft, long sheathed; sheaths at base yellowish brown, usually ± split into brown fibers. Involucral bracts leaflike, longer than subtending spike, not sheathed. Spikes 3-5, contiguous at upper part of culm; terminal spike male, linear-cylindric, 2-4 cm, shortly pedunculate; lateral spikes female, cylindric or oblong-cylindric, 2-4 cm, densely many flowered, lower spikes with long peduncles, peduncles up to 5 cm in length, upper ones rather short. Female glumes pale brown, oblong-ovate, 3.5-4 mm, membranous, 3-veined, apex acute or obtuse and mucronate. Utricles yellowish green, obliquely patent, longer than glume, oblong or subovate, trigonous, 4-5 mm, membranous, glabrous, many veined, base broadly cuneate, apex gradually narrowed to a long beak, orifice subtruncate or emarginate. Nutlets dark brown, loosely enclosed, elliptic, trigonous, ca. 1.8 mm, apex mucronate; style base not thickened; stigmas 3.

● Forests on mountain slopes; ca. 2900 m. Taiwan, Zhejiang.