NATIVEHabit: Plant loosely cespitose, 30--108 cm, lower stem often reddish; rhizome ascending; stolons short (0).
Leaf: flat, tip swollen and blunt or slightly swollen and acute; bright green to mid-green, shiny, turning red-brown to orange in autumn; basal leaves 4--8 mm wide; cauline (3)4--5, to 7--11.5 cm, 3--8 mm wide, lanceolate, acuminate, sheath mouth often hairy.
Inflorescence: loose, main branches occasionally to 14 cm, mature inflorescence straight and stiff to arching or nodding, if stiffly branched +- ovoid to +- lanceolate in outline; 4--26 cm, 3--13 cm wide; flowers mostly 1, occasionally a few in small clusters of 2--4, at tips of branches; bractlets generally not ciliate; lower bracts 1.5--4 cm, < inflorescence.
Flower: perianth parts 1.3--2.5 mm, acute to acuminate, upper margin often entire, generally pale to brown (dark brown), appressed to erect or only slightly curved; anthers 0.2--0.55 mm; style 0.1--0.3 mm, stigmas 0.6--0.9 mm.
Fruit: >= perianth, oblong-elliptic, acute to acuminate; valves 1.9--2.4 mm, 1--1.3 mm wide, generally pale to brown.
Seed: 1.1--1.3 mm, 0.6--0.7 mm wide; appendage 0--0.1 mm.
Chromosomes: 2n=24.
Ecology: Mesic to moist places in conifer woodland, forest edges, streambanks, trailsides, often shaded;
Elevation: < 3400 m.
Bioregional Distribution: NW exc NCoRI, CaRH, SNH, Wrn;
Distribution Outside California: to Alaska, South Dakota, New Mexico; southern Canada to eastern North America; Eurasia.
Fruiting Time: Apr--Aug
Note: Woodland plants with drooping branches easily recognized. Stiffness, length of inflorescence branches too variable within populations to recognize subsp.
fastigiata. Rigid extremes sometimes mistaken for
L. divaricata. At high elevations occasionally confused with
L. subcongesta when some flowers in small clusters at branch tips. Our plants mostly with shiny green leaves, pale perianth and capsules, but some CaR, Wrn populations with dark perianth and/or dark capsules, and plants sometimes with blue-green foliage, approaching
L. piperi but lacking its strongly curly-ciliate bracts, bractlets.
Synonyms: Juncoides parviflora (Ehrh.) Cov.; Juncus melanocarpus Michx.; Juncus parviflorus Ehrh.; Luzula parviflora (Ehrh.) Desv. subsp. fastigiata (E. Mey.) Hämet-Ahti; Luzula parviflora (Ehrh.) Desv. subsp. melanocarpa (Michx.) Tolm.; Luzula parviflora (Ehrh.) Desv. var. fastigiata (E. Mey.) Buchenau; Luzula parviflora (Ehrh.) Desv. var. melanocarpa (Michx.) A. Gray; Luzula parviflora (Ehrh.) Desv. var. parviflora
Jepson eFlora Author: Jan Kirschner & Peter Zika
Reference: Hämet-Ahti 1971 Ann Bot Fenn 8:368--381
Index of California Plant Names (ICPN; linked via the Jepson Online Interchange)
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