Carex iynx Nelmes

Robust dense tussocks to 90 cm high; tillers intravaginal. Stems ± terete, slender, smooth, drooping. Leaves 3–6 mm wide, ± = stems, shallowly channelled, light green; sheaths shining dark brown. Inflorescence a drooping panicle with long-peduncled spikes in fascicles of 1–5 from each node; bracts leaf-like, conspicuous but < inflorescence. Male spikes 1–3–(4), 2–7 cm × 1.5–2 mm, usually wholly male but occasionally with a few female flowers interspersed; glumes narrow-oblong. obtuse, occasionally short-awned. Female spikes 2.5–3–(6) cm × 4–7 mm, on extremely long, drooping, filiform peduncles, dense-flowered, occasionally with male flowers at top; glumes ± = utricles, 5.5–6.5 mm long, hyaline, light brown. Utricles ± 6 × 2 mm, ± nerved, margins scabrid in upper half, fusiform, beak 1–1.5 mm long, bifid, stip ± 0.5 mm long. Stigmas 3. Nut trigonous, obovoid.

[From: Healy and Edgar (1980) Flora of New Zealand. Volume 3.]