FLORA OF ICELAND elements: Carex lachenalii, Hare's-foot Sedge, Rjúpustör

Carex lachenalii; The Hare's-foot sedge is small to medium sized sedge. Different literature sources say it is 10 to 30cm tall on Iceland. I have though seen individual plants of just a few centimeters too. It forms dense tufts most of the times but here too, I have seen individual plants forming culms from a single sprouted plant. To me, the plant seems very variable, also in the shape of the culms (see below).
  The tufts usually do not have (anymore?) a basal rosette. Instead both generative and vegetative culms spread from the base. The leaves clasp the inflorescence stem at the bottom of the culm. Very often they grow rather horizontal. The leaves are give or take about 2mm broad. The longest one is as long or slightly longer than the culm. The culms usually bend. It depends however, if the culms first grow horizontal (than they bend upward) or vertically (than they bend downwards). The point is they start to nod during the development of the inflorescence.
  The spikes (3-4) are clustered at the top. The male flowers are situated at the bottom of the spikes. This leads to a characteristic feature after flowering: at the bottom of the spikes there is often a thin part consisting only of the stem and bracts. The female flowers have two stigma's, the fruits (therefore) lens-shaped. The utricles have distinct beakes which are relatively short.
  They are most common in highlands and mountains. I have seen it along coastal areas as well. Moist grounds, like around melting snow beds are preferred, but also other moist grounds.
  It is a member of the sedge family (Cyperaceae). The Icelandic name of this species is Rjúpustör.