Family: Restionaceae
Plant: A sedge up to 70cm high with male and female flowers on separate plants.
Flowers: Male spikelets are a rich purplish-brown, 2-4mm long and very numerous in a drooping panicle-like inflorescence borne at the ends of erect stems. The female spikelets are reddish, 12mm long and are borne in only a few erect spikes. The flower stems are erect, up to 1m high, 1-2mm diameter and are greyish-green in colour.
Flowering: October-December.
Fruit: A 1-3mm long narrow pale nut.
Leaves: Reduced to dark reddish brown leaf sheaths along the flowering stems.
Habitat: Common in damp to wet heathland.
Features: Male and female plants completely different in appearance. Greyish-green stems. Reddish-brown leaf sheaths.
Name:
Leptocarpus From Greek = slender-fruit
tenax From Latin = holding-fast
|
Type |
Sedge/Rush |
|
|
Flowers |
Form |
Irregular, Cluster, |
|
|
Colour(s) |
Red, Rust, Rust |
|
|
Petal/Sepal No. |
- |
|
|
Flowering Month |
10, 11, 12 |
|
Fruit |
Type |
Other |
|
|
Colour |
Brown |
|
|
Other Features |
Hard |
|
Leaves |
Arrangement |
Absent/Reduced |
|
|
Type |
- |
|
|
Shape |
- |
|
|
Length |
Tiny |
|
|
Margins |
- |
|
|
Attachment |
Stem-clasping |
|
|
Other Features |
- |
|
Bark |
- |
|
|
Habitat |
Heathland |
|