Carex preslii

Presl's sedge

Family: Cyperaceae · Type: perennial · Native

Presl's sedge is a California native perennial found in the Klamath Ranges, northern Coast Ranges, high Cascade Range, and Sierra Nevada Mountains in meadows, open forests, and dry rocky slopes at elevations of 1,800 to 3,400 meters. Its inflorescence features green and brown spikelets with subtle gold and red-brown highlights, creating a nuanced color palette across dense clusters. Growing with slender stems and flat to folded leaf blades 2 to 4 millimeters wide, this sedge forms delicate clumps in alpine and subalpine environments. The leaves have distinctive white, gold, and red-brown bracts with pale green centers, complemented by ovate perigynia that are green to gold with thin but opaque walls. Its small fruits measure 1.7 to 2.1 millimeters long, with beaks that vary between flat and cylindrical, creating intricate textural variations in the plant's appearance.

Habitat: Meadows, open forest, dry rocky slopes

Elevation: 1800-3400 m

Bioregions: KR, NCoR, CaRH, SNH

California counties: Mono, Siskiyou, El Dorado, Fresno, Humboldt, Nevada, Shasta, Tehama, Trinity, Inyo, Alpine, Mariposa, Lassen, San Bernardino, San Joaquin, Placer, Tulare, Kern, Plumas, Sierra, Lake, Tuolumne, Madera, Butte, Riverside, Sonoma

Data from The California Species Project — 14,000+ California species with verified data from CNPS, CDFW, USFWS, Jepson eFlora, Cal-IPC, and more.