Back
Sedge family (Cyperaceae)
Perennial forming a dense tussock or overlapping leaves. Stem cylindrical, though upper-part triangular in cross-section, growing 20-60 cm tall. Stem leaves with inflated sheath. Flowers hermaphrodite, clustered at the top of the stem in an oval-shaped single spike 1-2 cm long. Perianth formed from numerous short bristles, which elongate after flowering, creating a bunch of silky white fibres up to 2.5 cm in length. Fruits are nuts of length 2-3 mm, within a fluffy, spherical infructescence. Flowers Mar.-May.
Grows on wet, nutrient-poor soils. Occurs in marshy pine forest, more rarely in moist coniferous forest and on raised bogs.
Descriptions devised by the team at the Independent Department of Forest Botany, Warsaw University of Life Sciences, i.e. L. Witkowska-Żuk, K. Marciszewska, W. Ciurzycki, A. Obidziński and P. Zaniewski.
