Flora of New Zealand Series

Type locality: Craigieburn Mts, 6,000 ft. Type: WELT, 5147, A. Wall, mid-Feb., 1921, "a small form making a thick close turf"; isotype at CHR.

Shortly rhizomatous, forming a dense close turf. Culms 1–1.5–(10) cm. × < 0.5 mm., or up to 0.5 mm. diam. in taller plants, terete, shallowly grooved; basal sheaths chestnut-brown or yellow-brown. Lvs ± = or occ. much < culms, c. 0.3 mm. wide, plano-convex, setaceous, lamina involute just above wide brown sheath, margins smooth, tip obtuse. Infl. a solitary, terminal, androgynous spike of tightly clustered fls. Female fls 2–3, us. overtopping the 1–2 male fls. Lowest female glume bractiform, 4–7 mm. long, upper female glumes c. 3 mm. long, ovate, acute, brown, midrib green, margin hyaline. Utricles 2.5–3 × 1–2 mm., ovoid, subterete, very light brown to dark brown, paler towards the base, smooth, glab.; tapering to a darker beak c. 1 mm. long with a hyaline, oblique orifice; stipe minute or absent. Stigmas 3. Rhachilla, enclosed within utricle, c. 1 mm. long, 0.3 mm. diam. at the base, tapering to the truncate tip. Nut c. 1.5 mm. long, obtusely trigonous.

DIST.: S. Craigieburn Range; Taylor's Peak, Ashburton R.; and Hooker Glacier, Mt Cook; from 1,600–1,800 m. altitude.

The glab. utricle with its minute beak distinguishes this sp. from C. acicularis in which the utricle has a well-formed scabrid beak.