BOTANICAL AND ECOLOGICAL CHARACTERISTICS
SPECIES: Carex rostrata | Beaked Sedge 



GENERAL BOTANICAL CHARACTERISTICS : 
Beaked sedge is a large, water-obligate, native, grasslike perennial
[9,19,20,31].  The culms may be single or grouped together, ranging in
height from 12 to 48 inches (30-120 cm) [19,25,28].  The leaves are
similar to the stems in height, with 4 to 10 leaves per stem.  The
leaves are flat, glaucous, long, and wide [17,23,25].

Beaked sedge has a lifespan varying from 2 to 6 years [4,37].  Shoots
live 2 years in Minnesota, New York, and the Netherlands; 3 years in
central Sweden (longer in arctic and alpine regions); and 4 years in
northern Sweden.  Shoots that grow in summer live longer than those that
grow in spring [4].

Beaked sedge is a frost-tolerant, prolific seeder.  It forms indisticnt
tussocks that consist of dead or drying, fertile and old, and current
and new shoots [21].

Beaked sedge is often taller in unshaded areas than in the forest [4].


RAUNKIAER LIFE FORM : 
   Hemicryptophyte
   Geophyte
   Hydrophyte


REGENERATION PROCESSES : 
Beaked sedge reproduces by rhizomes varying from 0.4 inch to 2.75 yards
(1.0 cm-2.5 m) [4,20].  These produce a matted and tufted growth
pattern.  First a long rhizome emerges and a shoot is produced.  Then,
short rhizomes develop to produce a tuft of many shoots [3].  Dead
shoots with living roots can still establish daughter shoots from
rhizomes.  When shoots first develop, they do not have roots [22].

Beaked sedge also reproduces with stolons.  Young roots have been
observed developing near stolon tips [22].

Beaked sedge is a prolific seed producer and flowers from June to July
in Wyoming and North Dakota and from June to August in Montana [10].  Bud
generation occurs in August and September and shoots flower the
following summer [22].

Beaked sedge shoots can be spread by fragmentation.  Ice can break off
old shoots with associated roots.  Shoots may be transported by water
and caught by floating mats or end up on the shore.  These shoots can
root from the base and establish [22].


SITE CHARACTERISTICS : 
Beaked sedge is most common in wet meadows, marshes, edges of lakes,
ponds, and streams, and other riparian areas [9,17,19,23].  The surface
may be hummocky or mounded and in trough-shaped or flat-floored valleys
[18,30,45].  Beaked sedge grows best on gentle slopes [10].  It is
sometimes a dominant species in floating mats [9,27].

Beaked sedge is adapted a variety of mineral and organic soils
[9,17,36].  Many soils have large amounts of peat [9].  Other common
soils may be sandy, silty, clayey, loamy, clayey loam, alluvial, or
granitic [3,10,17,43].  Soil pH tolerance ranges from 3.0 to 7.9 [37].
Beaked sedge shows poor growth on sodic, saline and sodic saline soils
[10].  Beaked sedge grows in areas where water is as far as 32 inches (80
cm) below the soil surface, as well as in areas with standing water as
deep as 39 inches (1.0 m) [9,37,41,46].

The climate is often cool and semiarid, with a mean annual precipitation
of 12 inches (300 mm) [34,41].

Beaked sedge has a wide elevational range [10,31,34,40,46]:

                      feet              meters
Alberta         3,000 -  5,000        910 - 1,515
California      9,470 -  9,655      2,870 - 2,925
Colorado        6,500 - 11,000      1,970 - 3,335
Idaho           6,000 -  8,300      1,830 - 2,530     
Montana         2,500 -  7,000        760 - 2,120
Nevada          5,800 -  8,250      1,770 - 2,600
Utah            5,700 - 10,500      1,725 - 3,180
Wyoming         6,200 - 10,500      1,880 - 3,180

In Alberta, beaked sedge shoot density was reported to be 4,100 shoots
per square foot (370 shoots/sq m) [22].

Compared with its riparian associates, beaked sedge occurs on some of
the wettest sites [27,46].  There are three phases of beaked sedge
habitat; the wettest is indicated by codominance with awned sedge and
inflated sedge.  Water sedge and tufted hairgrass (Deschampsia
caespitosa) are indicators of drier sites where beaked sedge grows
[17,18].  Other associates include willow (Salix spp), sphagnum moss
(Sphagnum spp.), fewflowered spikesedge (Eleocharis pauciflora),
Kentucky bluegrass (Poa pratensis), common willow-herb (Epilobium
ciliatum), water horsetail (Equisetum fluvaiatile), purple cinquefoil
(Potentilla palustrus), and timothy (Phleum pratense) [5,16,32,41].


SUCCESSIONAL STATUS : 
Facultative Seral Species

Beaked sedge is characteristic of early seral, aquatic habitats [7].  It
is common in recently formed beaver ponds and on sites with a high water
table [16,31,46].  Beaked sedge communities have little species
diversity, and invasion is limited by the dense rhizome network
[6,16,31,35].

Beaked sedge is often succeeded by willows (Salix spp.), rushes (Juncus
spp.), and reed grasses (Calamagrostis spp.) [9,17,34,41].  It has
climax ecological status on wet sites of the Cascade Range [27].


SEASONAL DEVELOPMENT : 
Beaked sedge begins producing new green leaves in early spring [4,8,37];
growth at this time is rapid.  There is a decrease in root biomass, and
most energy is allocated to height increment [22,37].  In July, when
beaked sedge is almost at its full height, energy allocation is shifted
to shoot production [4,37].

Shoots emerge between July and August but may emerge in autumn also [4].
Flora primordia develop in August or September.  The shoot flowers the
following summer, generally in June and July [10,22].  Shoots that flower
usually die in late August or September [4].  Beaked sedge stays green
well into fall because of the moist habitat but does turn brown before
winter [3,8].

Many shoots emerge, overwinter, grow through the next season,
overwinter, flower, and then die in August [37].

Related categories for Species: Carex rostrata | Beaked Sedge