Eleocharis wolfii (Gray) Gray ex Britt. in H.N. Patterson

Locations ofEleocharis wolfii (Gray) Gray ex Britt. in H.N. Patterson in Virginia

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Detail

Family
Cyperaceae
Botanical Name
Eleocharis wolfii (Gray) Gray ex Britt. in H.N. Patterson
Common Name
Wolf's Spikerush
Synonym(s)
Flora of Virginia Name/Status
Eleocharis wolfii (Gray) Gray ex Britt. in H.N. Patterson
Comments
A Midwestern species resembling Eleocharis compressa in its compressed culms, but usually gray-green in color. It also has distinctive hyaline leaf sheaths and achenes with several distinct longitudinal ribs. Due to its immature condition, a 1995 collection from the Banister River went undetected until 2006; since then, additional stations have been found in this drainage. In 2019, Nelson Debarros discovered that Fairfax County populations previously misidentified as Eleocharis compressa were in fact E. wolfii. The Virginia populations, and one from Cabarrus Co., NC, are significantly disjunct from the species' main range and represent the only records from the Mid-Atlantic region.
Habitat
Poorly drained oak flatwoods dominated by Quercus phellos, Q. palustris, and Q. bicolor, in a Triassic Basin floodplain of the southern Piedmont; upland depression swamps of the northern Piedmont Culpeper Basin with similar clay, hardpan soils. Rare, Piedmont, known only from Pittsylvania and Fairfax counties.
Native Status
Native

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