Viviparous Spike Rush

Eleocharis vivipara Link, Hort. Berol. 1: 283. 1827
Chlorocharis vivipara Rikli, Jahrb. Wiss. Bot. 27 : 564. 1895. Eleocharis Ctirtisii Small, Man. SE. Fl. 165. 1933. (North Carolina.)
Erect from a stout often vertical rootstock covered by the culm-bases of the previous year ; roots coarse, deep brown ; culms 1-3 dm. high, filiform to 0.5 mm. wide, light green, faintly punctate, deeply striate to sulcate ; sheaths yellowish, often purple at the base, firm, acute and frequently lightly purple-tipped at the apex ; spikelets linear-cylindric, acute, manyflowered, 3-8 mm. long, usually wholly proliferous and seldom perfecting fruit; scales appressed, obtuse, 2 mm. long, usually without a keel, dark chestnut on the sides, with whitish hyaline margin, the lowest somewhat larger, erect and appressed to the base of the spikelet ; style trifid ; achene triangular, obovate, 1 mm. long, dark gray, coarsely reticulate to canccllate ; style-base pyramidal, narrower than the achene, light gray to nearly black with a whitened elevated ridge at the base ; bristles reddish-brown, closely retrorse-toothed, nearly equaling the achene.
Type locality : Grown at the Berlin Botanic Garden. Distribution : Swamps on the coastal plain : Virginia to Florida.