Sedge

Sedge, a name applied to most members of the order Cyperaceae, and especially to the genus Carex The order includes about 120 genera and 2,000 species, most abundantly represented in temperate and cold regions. It belongs to the Series Glumiferae, of the Sub-class Nudiflorae, among Monocotyledons, and consists of grass-like herbaceous plants, which have generally solid, jointed stems often three-sided; leaves, tristichous and furnished with a tubular sheath (not split, as in grasses); and splkelets of reduced, and often unisexual flowers, each in the axil of a glume. The perianth is only represented by a whorl of hairs or by adherent glumes forming the so-called 1utricle in some pistillate flowers. The stamens, though varying from one to twelve, are usually three, and have basifixed anthers. The ovary is syncarpous, of two or, more commonly, three carpels, with a style divided above, and one ovule. The embryo is at the base of the seed, but is surrounded by albumen. Several species, such as Carex arenaria, are valuable, as binding shifting sand with their creeping rhizomes; others, such as the bulrush Scirpus lacustris, are used for chair-bottoms. mats, etc.; the long perianth-hairs of the so-called "cotton grass," Eriphorum, are used, under the name of "Arctic wool," to stuff cushions; and Papyrus antiquorum, formerly abundant in the Nile, yielded the papyrus or paper of the ancients. The foliage is, as a rule, too harsh for fodder, and the albumen of their seeds does not improve or increase noticeably under cultivation.