Flora of New Zealand Series

Type locality: Milford Sound. Type: K, T. Kirk 1026, Jan., 1894; isotypes at WELT and AK.

Tufts dense, lfy, pale green. Culms 10–30 cm. × 0.5–1 mm., terete, glab.; basal sheaths light brown, occ. slightly reddish. Lvs us. noticeably > culms, 1–1.5 mm. wide, ± concave on upper surface, often with a median groove, convex on lower surface, margins scabrid, tips very much curled; sheaths very long, up to ½ length of lamina. Spikes 5–7; terminal spike male; remaining spikes female, occ. male at the base, 1–2 cm. × 4–7 mm., uppermost spikes ± approximate, sessile, lower spikes shortly pedunculate, the lowest more distant from the others; lf-like bracts subtending spikes very long, with curled tips. Glumes (excluding awn) slightly < utricles, ovate, acute or slightly emarginate, membr., cream with light brown striae, midrib even paler, produced to a slightly scabrid awn of variable length. Utricles 3–4 × c. 1 mm., subtrigonous, narrow-lanceolate, green to greenish brown with white to pale brown nerves, becoming indistinct at maturity, margins quite glab.; beak tapering very gradually, 1–1.5 mm. long, orifice bifid, glab.; stipe c. 0.5 mm. long. Stigmas 3. Nut c. 2 mm. long, trigonous, oblong-obovoid, dark brown.

DIST.: S. Fiordland.

Coastal.

Cheeseman (Man. N.Z. Fl. 1925, 273) treated C. pleiostachys as a synonym of C. comans which it resembles in its narrow, concavo-convex lvs and short, light coloured spikes. However, C. pleiostachys has broader spikelets and the glab. utricles are quite distinct from the scabrid-beaked utricles characteristic of C. comans.