Description

Scirpus-like Rush is a perennial grass-like herb with a rounded aerial stem that may reach 0.6 m in height, and also produces horizontal underground stems, or rhizomes. The leaves have a sheathing basal portion and an elongate and linear blade that is rounded in cross-section, unlike the flat blades found in most grass-like plants, and has a series of horizontal thickenings found at regular intervals along its length. The minute flowers, appearing in summer, are grouped in dense, rounded clusters on the branches of the upper part of the aerial stem. Each individual flower has 6 parts that are analogous to the green sepals and colored petals found on many kinds of flowers, but in this species the parts are only 2-4 mm in length, more-or-less similar in shape to each other, vary from green to light brown to reddish, and surround the 3 stamens, or pollen-producing structures within the flower. The fruit consists of a dry capsule that equals or slightly exceeds the flower parts, and when mature splits open to release the microscopic 0.4-0.5 mm brownish seeds.

Rank Justification

Critically imperiled in the nation or state because of extreme rarity (often 5 or fewer occurrences) or because of some factor(s) such as very steep declines making it especially vulnerable to extirpation from the state.