Zone 5b, Indiana.

Growing along the lakeside in areas where the water has receded. Moist to wet, full sun to part shade.

It reminds me of Carex or Cyperus, there's a few of them! I found two sites which might help,

https://docs.google.com/viewer...

Look at Cyperus strigosus in the non Carex sedges ..

http://www.kgnaturephotography...

http://www.kgnaturephotography...

http://131.230.176.4/imgs/para...

http://www.google.co.uk/search...

Most likely Yellow Nutsedge (Cyperus esculentus), although there is a large number of basically similar looking species in the genus.

It looks like mature Nutsedge to mee too.Awfully hard to get rid of.

Thank you for all of your suggestions! Having both of these names to compare made a definitive conclusion possible.


Janet, I am convinced that it is strigosus. The roots on mine have no "nuts". http://ir.library.oregonstate....

I dug up two specimens (at different stages of maturity) and mine definitely do not have them. Plus, the spikelets are scattered-looking, rather than in rows of four as in esculentas. The scale pattern matches as well.

As an aside - I almost wish it was esculentas...those tubers are edible and nutritious. I find learning about *different* food sources fascinating!

Thanks, again. I thought I'd never get this one figured out!

Pot luck I got the correct one!

Neither are listed in the Flora of US and Canada site but are both accepted on the Plant List, there's a lot of species! They might be under a synonym.

http://luirig.altervista.org/f...

It's listed in your link...under cyperus. It has cyperus hansenii listed after the = sign, does that mean it's the same plant? I didn't get that during my search.

Cyperus hansenii is a synonym of Cyperus strigosus. There are at least 20 species of Cyperus known to occur in Indiana and it's often difficult to distinguish one species from another.

Duh! I was looking under Carex!

They are both under Cyperus, of course.

http://luirig.altervista.org/f...