褐紫鳞薹草 he zi lin tai cao

Rhizome stoloniferous. Culms laxly tufted, 20-45 cm tall, obtusely trigonous, stiff, smooth, with bladeless sheaths at base. Leaves shorter or longer than culm, blades 3-5 mm wide, plicate proximally and flattened distally, sheathed. Involucral bracts leaflike, longer than spike, not sheathed or lowermost involucral bract shortly sheathed. Spikes 4 or 5; terminal 2 or 3 spikes male, narrowly cylindric, 1.5-4 cm, subsessile; remaining spikes female, remote, oblong-cylindric or broadly cylindric, 2-5 × 1-1.2 cm, densely many flowered, shortly pedunculate. Female glumes brown, lanceolate, ca. 4 mm, membranous, green costate, apex acuminate, muticous or mucronate. Utricles stramineous or sometimes slightly brown, obliquely patent, eventually divergent, longer than glume, ovate, inflated trigonous, ca. 5 mm, membranous, glabrous, shiny, 5-veined abaxially, base rounded, apex abruptly contracted into a medium-sized beak, orifice rather long 2-toothed, teeth slightly recurved. Nutlets usually immature; stigmas 3.

Swamps or wet places; ca. 3500 m. SW Sichuan, NW Yunnan [Bhutan, India (Sikkim)].