Carex praticolaRydb.

meadow sedge

WFO wfo-0000350258 Accepted WFO 2026-06 8 photographs CC BY

Plate 1 figs. a–h · 3 observations

This species has been photographed under an open licence only 3 times, so some figures below are different views of the same plant, taken on the same day, rather than different individuals. They are usually different parts of it: the leaf, the flower, the bark.

Carex praticola, photographed by Matt Lavin
fig. a Matt Lavin, CC BY 4.0 / 2019-07-26 / obs. 167676860

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.

Native range 28 botanical countries

Regions where Carex praticola is native: Alaska, Alberta, British Columbia, California, Colorado, Greenland, Idaho, Labrador, Maine, Manitoba, Michigan, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Newfoundland, North Dakota, Northwest Territories, Nunavut, Ontario, Oregon, Québec, Saskatchewan, South Dakota, Utah, Washington, Wyoming, Yukon AlaskaAlbertaBritish ColumbiaCaliforniaColoradoGreenlandIdahoLabradorMaineManitobaMichiganMinnesotaMontanaNevadaNew MexicoNewfoundlandNorth DakotaNorthwest TerritoriesNunavutOntarioOregonQuébecSaskatchewanSouth DakotaUtahWashingtonWyomingYukon
Native distribution of Carex praticola, 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.
RegionTDWG codeContinent
Alaska ASK NORTHERN AMERICA
Alberta ABT
British Columbia BRC
California CAL
Colorado COL
Greenland GNL
Idaho IDA
Labrador LAB
Maine MAI
Manitoba MAN
Michigan MIC
Minnesota MIN
Montana MNT
Nevada NEV
New Mexico NWM
Newfoundland NFL
North Dakota NDA
Northwest Territories NWT
Nunavut NUN
Ontario ONT
Oregon ORE
Québec QUE
Saskatchewan SAS
South Dakota SDA
Utah UTA
Washington WAS
Wyoming WYO
Yukon YUK

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 93 observations

Condition 5th percentile Median 95th percentile
Coldest month, mean daily low -24.5 °C -15.1 °C -7.3 °C
Warmest month, mean daily high 19.2 °C 22.2 °C 26.0 °C
Annual rainfall 377 mm 560 mm 1,010 mm
Rainfall in the driest quarter 40 mm 70 mm 210 mm

It is found where winters are severely cold. This is not care advice and it is not a forecast. It is a measurement: we sampled the climate at every one of the 93 research-grade observations of Carex praticola 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 9 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 furva (L.H.Bailey) Piper
  • Carex piperi Mack.
  • Carex platylepis Mack.
  • Carex pratensis Drejer
  • Carex pratensis f. furva (L.H.Bailey) Kük.
  • Carex pratensis var. furva L.H.Bailey
  • Carex praticola var. furva (L.H.Bailey) A.Heller
  • Carex praticola var. praticola
  • Carex praticola var. subcoriacea F.J.Herm.

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.