Flora of New Zealand Series

From sea level to 1,000 m. altitude in forest, fescue-tussock grassland, or on sand dunes.

Original localities: "Northern Island; Tigadu, Banks and Solander; Auckland, Sinclair." Type: K, Auckland, Sinclair.

Densely tufted, 30–60 cm. high. Culms < or > lvs, often exceedingly elongated at maturity, up to 300 cm. long and prostrate, < 1 mm. diam., often almost filiform, trigonous or subtrigonous, glab. or slightly scabrid below the infl.; basal sheaths dark brown or red-brown, nerves distinct. Lvs 1–2.5–(3) mm. wide, channelled, light green, often reddish, harshly scabrid. Spikes 3–5, ± approximate; terminal spike male, c. 1 mm. diam., ± = female spikes in length, on a filiform peduncle; remaining spikes female, 0.5–2.5–(3) cm. × c. 5 mm., often with a few male fls at the base, sessile, or the lowest more distant and shortly pedunculate. Glumes (excluding awn) ± = utricle, broadly ovate, thin and membr., often deeply emarginate, occ. entire, very light brown with darker flecks, midrib us. brown-spotted, produced to a scabrid awn of variable length. Utricles c. 2.5 × 1.5 mm., ± plano-convex, broadly ovoid, pale yellow-brown below, purple-brown above, nerved, more strongly so on the more convex face, shining, narrowed abruptly to the deeply bifid beak c. 0.5 mm. long, margins and orifice us. finely scabrid, occ. ± contracted below to a stipe c. 0.5 mm. long. Stigmas 2. Nut c. 1.5 mm. long, biconvex, dark brown, almost black.

DIST.: N. Throughout but rare on the eastern side. S. Rather scattered throughout.

In both C. testacea and C. flagellifera the culms may elongate at maturity to a far greater length than is found in other N.Z. spp. of Carex, but the culms of C. flagellifera do not seem to reach the lengths attained by some specimens of C. testacea.

Specimens of C. testacea collected in forest have longer, darker brown spikes than those in plants collected in tussock grassland or on sand dunes. Forms with short, closely contiguous spikes can only be distinguished from C. wakatipu by the narrower, more harshly scabrid lvs, and smaller, more distinctly beaked utricles.