Common Name: CATTAIL FAMILY
Habit: Perennial herb, glabrous; monoecious; rhizomes or stolons long; colonial, in wet soil to aquatic. Stem: aerial stem 1, +- cylindric. Leaf: basal and cauline, alternate, 2-ranked, spongy; sheath open; ligule 0; blade +- linear. Inflorescence: spike-like or of spheric, unisexual heads; staminate flowers or heads distal to pistillate ones. Flower: small, densely-packed. Staminate Flower: filaments fused proximally. Pistillate Flower: pistil 1, ovary superior, ovules 1--2(4). Fruit: follicle, splitting in water, or drupe-like.
Genera In Family: 2 genera, +- 32 species: worldwide.
eFlora Treatment Author: S. Galen Smith
Scientific Editor: Douglas H. Goldman, Bruce G. Baldwin.

Common Name: BUR-REED
Habit: Plants generally submerged except inflorescence, or vegetative when all-submerged (emergent to +- terrestrial); rhizomes, stolons slender. Stem: unbranched proximal to inflorescence. Leaf: blade flat to convex, 3-sided, or abaxially keeled. Inflorescence: heads axillary and terminal, 2--60+; bracts leaf-like, distal reduced. Staminate Flower: stamens 2--8. Pistillate Flower: ovary chambers 1--2(4), stigmas generally 1(2--4). Fruit: drupe-like, spongy; perianth parts attached, style and generally stigmas persistent as beak; floating, water-dispersed.
Etymology: (Probably Greek: swaddling band, for strap-shaped leaves) Note: Fruit head diam including fruit beaks; fruit body lengths except beak, stalk-like base; beak lengths including stigmas.
Reference: Kaul 2000 FNANM 22:271--277
Unabridged Reference: Cook & Nicholls 1986 Bot Helv 96:213--267, 1987 Bot Helv 97:1--44

Habit: Plants robust, erect, emergent to +- terrestrial, not aquatic, to +- 2.5 m. Leaf: blades thick to thin, 3-angled proximally, flat or keeled distally. Inflorescence: main axis branches (0)1--4, heads >= 2 per branch; staminate heads +- 10--60; pistillate heads (1)2--8, 1.5--3 cm diam in fruit. Flower: perianth parts dark-thickened distally; stigmas > 1 on 5--100% of pistillate flowers, 3--4 mm. Fruit: body 5--9 mm, 3--7 mm wide, obconic, 3--6-angled, base not stalk-like, tip +- truncate to hemispheric, beak 1--4 mm. Chromosomes: 2n=30.
Note: Varieties intergrade where distributions overlap.
Unabridged Note: Closely related to variable Old World Sparganium erectum sensu lato.