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Brome-like Sedge

Carex bromoides

Brome-like sedge is the finest-textured of the eastern wetland sedges, its leaves barely a sixteenth of an inch wide, arching out into soft low tussocks that read almost as mown lawn from a distance. It is named for the resemblance of its slender seed spikes to a brome grass, and it flowers very early, often in March, well ahead of most sedges. It grows in seeps, spring runs, wet woods and the mucky margins of shaded streams, frequently in colonies dense enough to exclude everything else. Because it holds most of its foliage through winter and stays under a foot, it is one of the better native substitutes for a shade lawn in ground too wet for turf. The tussocks are soft enough to cross occasionally, though not to take real traffic. It asks for shade and steady moisture, and it browns out in a dry summer.

Family

Cyperaceae

Type

grass

Lifespan

perennial

Height

0.75–1 ft

Spacing

1.25–1.75 ft apart

Light

sun, part shade

Soil moisture

moist

Soil pH

acidic, neutral

Bloom

March, April, May, June

Bloom colors

green, brown

Wildlife value

butterflies, songbirds

Landscape uses

groundcover, rain garden

Native states

AL, AR, CT, DC, DE, FL, GA, IL, IN, KY, LA, MA, MD, ME, MI, MN, MO, MS, NC, NH, NJ, NY, OH, PA, RI, SC, TN, TX, VA, VT, WI, WV