North American Yellow Nutsedge Gardens Away From Field and Row Crops

Summary: North American yellow nutsedge gardens, as ground cover, run amok in bean, corn, cotton and potato fields through herbicides, nematodes, seeds and tubers.

yellow nutsedge (Cyperus esculentes); mid-September 2005: Blahedo, CC BY SA 2.5 Generic, via Wikimedia Commons

North American yellow nutsedge gardens address a tragic interval in North America's natural history whereby the grass-like native perennial herb assumes weed designations only since the mid-twentieth century's use of selective herbicides.

Selective weedkillers blast life cycle-disrupting chemicals into specific targets and become part of regular treatment schedules that batter survival of targets and better that of non-targets. Yellow nutsedge and non-native, related members in the Cyperaceae family of herbaceous sedges compete with bean, corn, cotton and potato crops despite non-selective and selective controls. Arkansas decries Indian and west Asian purple nutsedge while British Columbia provincial, California, Oregon and Washington state and Mexican federal legislation deplore it and yellow nutsedge.

Alberta, Manitoba, Nova Scotia and Quebec provincial legislation in Canada and Colorado and Hawaii state legislation in the United States enact restrictions just against yellow nutsedge.

Yellow nutsedge, nicknamed chufa, chufa flatsedge, coco, coco edge, earth almond, edible galingale, northern nut grass and rush nut, favors grass-like, shiny cotyledons for rare seedlings.

Embryonic leaves give way to three to seven mature 7.88- to 35.43-inch- (20- to 90-centimeter-) long, 0.16- to 0.35-inch- (4- to 9-millimeter-) wide leaves per stem. Glossy, mature, waxy foliage has closed, triangular sheaths whose foliar bases hold onto lower stem parts and whose tops harbor neither ear-like auricles or outward-projecting ligules. Alternate-arranged, grass-like, sharp-tipped, three-ranked leaves with prominent midribs incline from triangular, 0.13- to 0.24-inch- (3.4- to 6-millimeter-) wide stems with red-brown bases and stout basal bulbs.

Mature, 5.91- to 35.43-inch (15- to 90-centimeter-) tall nutsedge, named Cyperus esculentus (edible galingale), juggles floral leaves, called bracts, in North American yellow nutsedge gardens.

Three- to nine-whorled, 1.97- to 11.81-inch- (5- to 30-centimeter-) long, 0.02- to 0.16-inch- (0.5- to 4-millimeter-) wide bracts keep branching, umbrella-shaped, yellow-brown inflorescences called panicles together.

Panicles link 10 to 20 stalkless, unbranched, 0.39- to 1.18-inch- (1- to 3-centimeter-) long, 0.48- to 1.38-inch- (12- to 35-millimeter-) wide spikelets to their main stems. They manage four to 10 straplike, 0.79- to 4.72-inch- (2- to 12-centimeter-) long rays and six to 34 0.07- to 0.11-inch- (1.8- to 2.7-millimeter-) long scales. July- through September-blooming flowers less than 0.08 inches (2 millimeters) across need one pistil with a three-lobed style and three stamens to nurture fruits called achenes.
North American yellow nutsedge gardens offer 0.05- to 0.07-inch- (1.2- to 1.8-millimeter-) long, 0.01- to 0.03-inch- (0.3- to 0.8-millimeter-) wide seeds from dry, non-explosive, one-seeded achenes.

A 0.24- to 0.98-inch- (6- to 25-millimeter) depth at 68 to 86 degrees Fahrenheit (20 to 30 degrees Celsius) produces germinated oval, shiny, three-sided, white-brown seeds.
The 90,000-plus seeds per plant quit being viable after 60 years while black, woody tubers at the tips of creeping, fibrous roots quit after 3.5 years. Each 0.32- to 0.75-inch- (8- to 19-millimeter-) long tuber reproduces 10-plus fibrous roots and stout basal bulbs, 1,900 plants and 7,000 tubers over 6.89-foot (2.1-meter) areas. Tubers survive at minus 0.4 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 18 degrees Celsius) above-ground and at 20.3 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 6.5 degrees Celsius) down to 9.06-inch (23-centimeter-) depths.

North American yellow nutsedge gardens turn out the best yellow nutsedge, described by Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus (May 23, 1707-Jan. 10, 1778), away from cultivated crops.

yellow nutsedge's seed head; image prepared by Mark Mohlenbrock, in Biotic Consultants, Inc., Robert H. Mohlenbrock and Mark Mohlenbrock, "Chufa flatsedge Cyperus esculentis L.," Midwestern Wetland Flora Field Office Guide to Plant Species (Lincoln NE: Midwest National Technical Center, 1997): Robert H. Mohlenbrock/USDA NRCS PLANTS Database, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

yellow nutsedge (Cyperus esculentus); mid-September 2005: Blahedo, CC BY SA 2.5 Generic, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cyperus_esculentus.jpg

yellow nutsedge's seed head; image prepared by Mark Mohlenbrock, in Biotic Consultants, Inc., Robert H. Mohlenbrock and Mark Mohlenbrock, "Chufa flatsedge Cyperus esculentis L.," Midwestern Wetland Flora Field Office Guide to Plant Species (Lincoln NE: Midwest National Technical Center, 1997): Robert H. Mohlenbrock/USDA NRCS PLANTS Database, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cyperus_esculentus_NRCS-1.jpg;
Not copyrighted and may be freely used for any purpose, via USDA NRCS PLANTS Database @ https://plants.usda.gov/home/plantProfile?symbol=CYES
U.S. Department of Agriculture, National Agricultural Library, Copyright Status: Not provided. Contact Holding Institution to verify copyright status, via Biodiversity Heritage Library @ https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/47568604

For further information:

"Cyperus esculentus L." Tropicos® > Name Search.
Available @ http://www.tropicos.org/Name/9901112

Dickinson, Richard; and Royer, France. 2014. Weeds of North America. Chicago IL; London, England: The University of Chicago Press.

Linnaeus, Carl. 1753. "7. Cyperus esculentus." Species Plantarum, vol. I: 45. Holmiae [Stockholm, Sweden]: Laurentii Salvii [Laurentius Salvius].
Available via Biodiversity Heritage Library @ http://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/449630

Weakley, Alan S.; Ludwig, J. Christopher; and Townsend, John F. 2012. Flora of Virginia. Edited by Bland Crowder. Fort Worth TX: BRIT Press, Botanical Research Institute of Texas.