西藏嵩草 xi zang song cao

Kobresia capillifolia (Decaisne) C. B. Clarke var. tibetica (Maximowicz) Kükenthal.

Rhizomes short. Basal sheaths prominent, brown to dark brown, dull, not retaining dried leaf blades. Culms densely tufted, rigid and erect, subterete or upper part trigonous, 10-40 cm tall, 1-1.5 mm in diam. Leaves basal, erect, shorter than culms; blade filiform (tubular in section), 0.5-1 mm wide. Inflorescence spicate, brown or dark brown, broadly and densely cylindric, 1-2.5 × 0.3-0.4 cm; terminal spikelets male, lower ones bisexual; lowest involucral bract glumelike, apex aristate or not. Bisexual spikelets with a basal female flower and 2-4 distal male flowers. Glumes brown or dark brown, with pale midvein, oblong to ovate-oblong, 3.5-4.5 × 1.5-2.5 mm, obtuse, midvein narrow, margin narrowly hyaline or not. Prophylls pale colored to yellowish brown or occasionally brown, oblong-ovate, 2.1-3 × 1-1.4 mm, hyaline to very thinly membranous, usually without keels and veins, rarely obscurely keeled, margins free to base. Nutlets brown or dark brown, oblong or narrowly ovoid-oblong, flattened-trigonous, slightly shorter than prophylls, 1.5-2.5(-3) × 1-1.4 mm, very shortly stipitate, shortly beaked. Stigmas 3. Fl. and fr. May-Aug.

● Alpine swampy meadows, weedy plains, marshes, riversides; 2500-4600 m. Gansu, Qinghai, Sichuan, Xinjiang, Xizang.

This species is distinguished from Kobresia capillifolia with difficulty: the culm is wider, and longer in relation to the leaves, and the spike is shorter in proportion to breadth, and much shorter in proportion to the length of the culm (resembling an Eleocharis).