Plants loosely cespitose; rhizomes short; stolons present, often long. Culms sometimes curved, slender, 10-40 cm. Leaves: sheaths gray-brown to pale brown abaxially, inner band thin, hyaline, often red tinged, summit prolonged, concave; ligules as long as wide; blades yellowish green to pale gray-green, flat, 5-20 cm × 1-3 mm, subequal or shorter than culms, soft. Inflorescences 1.5-5 cm × 7-12 mm; proximal bracts scalelike, sometimes bristlelike, shorter than spikes. Spikes 3-6, gynecandrous, proximal spikes separate, usually 1-1.5 cm apart, distal approximate, individually distinct, containing 5-15(-20) perigynia, oblong, 5-15 × 4-6 mm; terminal spike conspicuously staminate at base, long-clavate, 10-20 mm. Pistillate scales pale red-brown with lighter center and narrow hyaline margins, ovate, ± equaling, concealing perigynia, apex obtuse. Perigynia appressed-ascending, gray-green, often reddish dotted, often pale brown in age, finely several-veined, oblong-elliptic, 2.5-3.3 × 1.5-2 mm, widest near middle, coriaceous; beak entire or with few marginal teeth. Achenes pale brown to gray-brown, oblong, 1.75-2 × 1.25-1.5 mm, dull. 2n = 64. Fruiting Jun-Aug. Coastal and estuarine marshes, mostly brackish soils, seashores; 0-600 m; Greenland; B.C., Man., N.B., Nfld. and Labr., N.W.T., N.S., Ont., P.E.I., Que., Sask., Yukon; Alaska, Maine; Europe; Asia.
