| Spikelets 1–7-flowered, lowest flower alone hermaphrodite; glumes not distichous. Stamens 3, rarely elongating. Hypogynous bristles wanting | 9. Cladium. |
| Spikelets 1–3-flowered, upper flower alone hermaphrodite. Stamens 3, rarely elongating. Hypogynous bristles present | 10. Lepidosperma. |
| Tall, harsh and grassy. Spikelets 1–3-flowered, upper flower alone hermaphrodite. Stamens 3–6, usually elongating in fruit and holding the nut. Hypogynous bristles wanting | 11. Gahnia. |
| Dwarf alpine plants forming dense cushions in bogs. Spikelets solitary or 2–3 together, 1-flowered; glumes 3. Hypogynous scales (perianth) 6, persistent | 12. Oreobolus. |
| Tribe Cariceæ.—Spikelets monœcious, the male and female flowers in the same or in distinct spikelets; rarely diœcious. Nuts enclosed in an entire or 2-fid inflated sac (utricle). | |
| Spikelet solitary, androgynous. Rhachilla produced beyond the utricle into a hooked bristle | 13. Uncinia. |
| Spikelet solitary, or more often clustered or spicate or panicled, androgynous or unisexual. Rhachilla not produced beyond the utricle | 14. Carex. |
1. KYLLINGA, Rottb.
Stems slender, simple, erect, leafy at the base. Spikelets small, numerous, compressed, 1–3-flowered, densely crowded in 1–3 ovoid or cylindric terminal heads or spikes subtended by. 2–6 unequal linear leaf-like bracts. Glumes 4–7, distichous; the two lowest small, empty; the next, or rarely the two next, hermaphrodite and fruit-bearing; the upper ones male or the uppermost smaller and empty; in fruit the rhachilla falls away above the two lowest glumes. Hypogynous scales wanting. Stamens 1–3. Style continuous with the ovary, not thickened at the base; branches 2, filiform. Nut laterally compressed, smooth.
A genus of about 40 species, widely spread through the warmer regions of both hemispheres, but not found in Europe.
1. K. brevifolia, Rottb. Desc. et Ic. t. i, f. 3.—Rhizome creeping, elongate. Stems numerous from the rhizome, slender, 4–12 in. high or more. Leaves flat, grassy, usually shorter than the stems, 110–16 in. broad. Bracts usually 3, spreading, similar to the leaves. Spikes solitary or rarely 2–3 together, broadly ovoid, greenish, ⅕–⅓ in. long. Spikelets about ⅛ in.; fertile flower usually solitary. Glume of fertile flower ovate, mucronate, eglandular, keeled; keel not winged above, 3-nerved; sides of glume with 3–4 striæ. Stamens 2. Nut ellipsoid, pale yellow-brown, about half as long as the glume.—C. B. Clarke in Hook. f. Fl. Brit. Ind. vi. 588. K. monocephala, Cheesem. in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xi. (1879) 434 (not of Rottb.).
North Island: Auckland—From Mongonui and Ahipara northwards to the North Cape, W. T. Ball! T.F.C. December–February.
