Thursday 30 June 2011

An easy sedge!

There are about 35 different sedges on Islay, out of over 100 occurring in Britain. Some are quite difficult to tell apart, but others are relatively easy, including this one: Green-ribbed Sedge (Carex binervis). It is quite tall, from 30 to 90 cm (1 to 3 feet), occasionally more, and is particularly distinguished from other sedges by the arrangement of the one male and two to four female spikes. The male spike is, as usual, at the top - long and thin - with a small female spike immediately below it, and then longer gaps to the subsequent female spikes, with the bottom one the largest, and with quite a long stalk so that it generally hangs downwards.

There, said it was easy!
Malcolm

1 comment:

  1. Thanks, Malcolm, I'll look out for it.
    Becky

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