Carex caroliniana Schwein.

Carex caroliniana Schw. Ann. Lye. N. Y. 1: 67. 1824
Carex Smithii Porter; Olney, Caric. Bor.-Am. 2, without description. 1871; Wood, Bot. & Fl. ed.
1873. 374. 1873. (Type from southeastern Pennsylvania.) Not C. Smithii Tausch, 1821. Carex gynandra var. caroliniana Olney, Caric. Bor.-Am. 5. 1871. (Based by synonymy on C.
caroliniana Schw.) Carex triceps var. Smithii Porter; L. H. Bailey, Bot. Gaz. 13: 88. 1888. (Based on C. Smithii
Porter.)
Densely cespitose, not stoloniferous, the culms slender but stiff and erect, 2.5-8 dm. high, growing in small to medium-sized clumps, glabrate, triangular with concave sides, usually much exceeded by the upper leaves, aphyllopodic, strongly reddened at base; well-developed leaves usually 4 or 5 to a culm, on the lower half (except uppermost) but not bunched, not septate-nodulose, the blades essentially glabrate, but with traces of pubescence especially below and toward the base, 1-3 dm. long, 1.5-3 mm. wide, not stiff, flat, erect-ascending, the upper culm-leaf inserted from 2-12 cm. below the inflorescence and much exceeding it; the sheaths long, tight, more or less strongly soft-hairy, truncate at mouth, reddish-brown-tinged or spotted ventrally, the ligule about as long as wide; spikes usually 3, oblong-cylindric to cylindric, 8-18 mm. long, 4 mm. wide, the uppermost gynaecandrous with its lower half staminate, the others pistillate, all approximate or the lower slightly remote, erect, sessile or slightly peduncled, closely 15-30-flowered in several rows; lowest bract about 1 mm. wide, several times the length of the inflorescence, not sheathing, the others much smaller; pistillate scales ovate-triangular, not pilose, straw-colored and slightly reddish-brown-tinged, with broad hyaline margins and 3-nerved green center, narrower and shorter than the perigynia, varying from short-cuspidate to obtuse; staminate scales straw-colored with green midrib, acuminate; perigynia obovoid-orbicular, obscurely obtusely triangular, being nearly round in cross-section, turgid and not flattened, squarrose-spreading at maturity, brownish-green, strongly few-ribbed, submembranaceous, glabrous or slightly asperulous, 2 mm. long, 1.5 mm. wide, tapering at base, abruptly tapering above and short-pointed or at times slightly beaked, the orifice entire or minutely emarginate; achenes strongly triangular with concave sides and prominent rounded angles, not entirely filling perigynium, broadly obovoid, sessile, 1.5-2 mm. long, somewhat narrower, with abruptly bent very short-apiculate tip, jointed with the very short thickish style; stigmas 3, slender, short.
Type locality: "Carol."
Distribution: Dry meadows, New Jersey and Pennsylvania to North Carolina and Texas. (Specimens examined from New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, District of Columbia, Virginia, West Virginia, North Carolina, Ohio, Indiana, Tennessee, Missouri, Arkansas, Oklahoma,