Lurid Sedge (Carex lurida)
- Family: Sedge (Cyperaceae)
- Flowering: May-September.
- Field Marks: This species has slender male spikes and short, thick female spikes. The perigynia are inflated at the base and taper abruptly to a slender, 2-toothed beak.
- Habitat: Around lakes and ponds, along streams, wet meadows, wet prairies.
- Habit: Perennial herb with thickened rootstocks.
- Stems: Erect, usually smooth, up to 2 1/2 feet tall.
- Leaves: Elongated, narrow, rough to the touch, up to 1/2 inch broad.
- Flowers: Male and female borne separately; the male in a single, slender spike up to 3 inches long; the female in 1-4 oblong-cylindric spikes up to 2 inches long and up to 1 inch thick.
- Scales: Broadly lanceolate, tapering to a slender awn; the scale shorter than the perigynium.
- Sepals: 0.
- Petals: 0.
- Stamens: 3.
- Pistils: Enclosed in a perigynium; each perigynium ovoid, inflated, strongly ribbed, up to 1/2 inch long, tapering to a beak about as long as the body.
- Fruits: Achenes slightly granular, triangular, obovoid, up to 1/8 inch long.
- Notes: The achenes are eaten by waterfowl. Atlas of the Flora of the Great Plains by McGregor, et al. (1981) does not attribute this species to areas 4 or 5, although the National Wetlands Inventory lists it from there.
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