Carex cephalophoraMuhl. ex Willd.

oval-leaf sedge

WFO wfo-0000345417 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 8 separate observations

Carex cephalophora, photographed by Ryan Sorrells
fig. a Ryan Sorrells, CC BY 4.0 / 2021-06-18 / obs. 137310999
Carex cephalophora, photographed by Owen Strickland
fig. b Owen Strickland, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 80720362
Carex cephalophora, photographed by Quinten Wiegersma
fig. c Quinten Wiegersma, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 77702746
Carex cephalophora, photographed by Mike B
fig. d Mike B, CC BY-SA 4.0 / obs. 77035351
Carex cephalophora, photographed by Quinten Wiegersma
fig. e Quinten Wiegersma, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 55660464
Carex cephalophora, photographed by Reuven Martin
fig. f Reuven Martin, CC0 1.0 / obs. 43673722
Carex cephalophora, photographed by Quinten Wiegersma
fig. g Quinten Wiegersma, CC BY 4.0 / obs. 41964959
Carex cephalophora, photographed by Reuven Martin
fig. h Reuven Martin, CC0 1.0 / obs. 42034403

Every figure is a research-grade observation under CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA, rehosted with the photographer’s name, the licence and the observation it came from. Photographs under a NonCommercial licence are excluded from this site and are never stored, which costs us a great many pictures and is not negotiable.

The specimen a real sheet, in a real collection

Herbarium
The New York Botanical Garden
Accession
2333277
Filed as
Carex cephalophora Muhl. ex Willd.
Det. by
R. F. C. Naczi 2019-01-01
Collected
W. H. Wiegmann 1945-06-16
Origin
US
The sheet
View the digitised specimen (CC BY 4.0)

A real pressed plant, in a real collection, under the accession number above. Not an illustration of one. The holding institution does not serve this sheet’s image to third parties, so there is no photograph here. The record is real and the link goes to it. Where we hold no openly licensed sheet for a species this section is simply absent, and where a sheet never recorded who determined it, that field stays empty rather than being filled in. Roughly half of all herbarium sheets never recorded a determiner, which is ordinary.

Native range 37 botanical countries

Regions where Carex cephalophora is native: Alabama, Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Ontario, Pennsylvania, Québec, Rhode I., South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin AlabamaArkansasConnecticutFloridaGeorgiaIllinoisIndianaIowaKansasKentuckyLouisianaMaineMarylandMassachusettsMichiganMinnesotaMissouriNebraskaNew HampshireNew JerseyNew YorkNorth CarolinaOhioOklahomaOntarioPennsylvaniaQuébecSouth CarolinaTennesseeTexasVermontVirginiaWest VirginiaWisconsin DelawareDistrict of ColumbiaRhode I.
Native distribution of Carex cephalophora, after Kew’s World Checklist of Vascular Plants. Introduced, extinct and doubtful records are excluded, so this is where the plant is from, not everywhere it now grows. Regions too small to draw at this scale are marked with a dot.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Alabama ALA NORTHERN AMERICA
Arkansas ARK
Connecticut CNT
Delaware DEL
District of Columbia WDC
Florida FLA
Georgia GEO
Illinois ILL
Indiana INI
Iowa IOW
Kansas KAN
Kentucky KTY
Louisiana LOU
Maine MAI
Maryland MRY
Massachusetts MAS
Michigan MIC
Minnesota MIN
Missouri MSO
Nebraska NEB
New Hampshire NWH
New Jersey NWJ
New York NWY
North Carolina NCA
Ohio OHI
Oklahoma OKL
Ontario ONT
Pennsylvania PEN
Québec QUE
Rhode I. RHO
South Carolina SCA
Tennessee TEN
Texas TEX
Vermont VER
Virginia VRG
West Virginia WVA
Wisconsin WIS

Region boundaries approximated from Natural Earth (public domain) and mapped to TDWG World Geographical Scheme for Recording Plant Distributions (WGSRPD) level-3 botanical countries (Brummitt 2001). Indicative, not the official WGSRPD geometry.

Where it actually grows measured, from 613 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low -11.4 °C -7.2 °C 1.1 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 24.8 °C 27.5 °C 31.7 °C
Annual rainfall 869 mm 1,020 mm 1,364 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 122 mm 199 mm 296 mm

It is found where winters bring hard frost. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 613 research-grade observations of Carex cephalophora that carry a coordinate, and this is the range those places actually span. The 5th and 95th percentiles are used rather than the minimum and maximum, because a single cultivated specimen in a heated conservatory should not widen a tropical plant's range to the Arctic.

This is not a hardiness zone. A USDA zone is the average annual extreme minimum temperature. The figure above is the mean daily minimum of the coldest month, which is a different quantity and is typically far warmer. Reading one as the other would place a plant several zones too warm, so we do not publish a hardiness zone, because we do not have one.

Also published as 6 synonyms

A synonym is not an error. It is a record of botanists disagreeing, in print, about where this plant belongs. Each of these was somebody’s considered answer.

  • Carex cephalophora var. anomala Farw.
  • Carex cephalophora var. bracteosa Farw.
  • Carex cephalophora var. cephalophora
  • Carex cephalophora var. maxima Dewey
  • Diemisa cephalophora (Muhl. ex Willd.) Raf.
  • Vignea cephalophora (Muhl. ex Willd.) Rchb.

Sourcesevery claim on this page

  1. World Flora Online Plant List. accepted name, authority, classification. CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-12.
  2. iNaturalist. photographs and flowering annotations, CC0 / CC BY / CC BY-SA only. per photograph. Retrieved 2026-06-27.
  3. Wikidata. common name (P1843), joined on the World Flora Online identifier (P7715). CC0. Retrieved 2026-07-13.
  4. Kew, World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP v16). native distribution by TDWG level-3 botanical country, and life form. CC BY 3.0. Retrieved 2026-06-04.

We publish what we can source and we say so when we cannot. This page has no care advice and no toxicity claim, because we do not yet have those from a source we can cite.