Australian Tropical Rainforest Plants - Online edition

Carex cryptostachys Brongn.


Grass
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Herbarium specimen. © CSIRO
Family

Brongniart, A.T. in Duperrey, L.I. (1833) Voyage Autour du Monde. Botanique 2: 152, t.25. Type: Offack dans lile Waigiou, lune des iles des Papous.

Stem

Tufted sedge with an elongated rhizome clothed in fibrous remains of the leaf sheaths.

Leaves

Leaves bright rich green, longer than inflorescence; flat with 2 prominent raised veins parallel to midrib, margins scabrid, 3-18 mm wide; leaf sheath finely ciliate.

Flowers

Flowering stems obtusely trigonous 10-50 cm tall with sheaths and peduncles from base; lax flowered with 6-30 spikelets; male part of inflorescence much shorter than female part; bracts shorter than spikelets; glumes ovate, amplexicaul, many-nerved, obtuse, ciliolate, apiculate; utricles obscurely trigonous, broadly stipitate, abruptly shortly beaked with an oblique, bidentate mouth. Style papillose. Stigmas three.

Fruit

Nut trigonous with the faces excavated at the base and the apex, broadly stipitate and seated on a spongy disc-like body about 2 mm long; beak short and deflexed

Seedlings

Features not available.

Distribution and Ecology

Occurs in CYP (rarely recorded) and in NEQ. Altitudinal range from 25-770 m. Found on the rainforest floor and along creeks in rainforest. Also occurs in Malesia.

RFK Code
4193
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