Plant Wiki

The open plant encyclopedia

Know any plant.
Grow it well.

Snap a photo or search by any name to see how to care for it, where it comes from, whether it's safe, and a 3D model you can turn.

  • 13,000+plants with full pages
  • 365,000+plant species worldwide
  • 220+countries covered

Common in

See all

The plants people record most in your country, and ones that grow there wild.

What do you want to do?

Popular plants

Browse all plants

See them in 3D

All plants in 3D

Browse plants

Filter by what you want to do, shape, origin, country, care and safety.

Plant Wiki › Browse plants

Blunt spikerush

Eleocharis obtusa

Also called Blunt spike rush, Blunt Spikesedge

Blunt spikerush
Photo: Robert H. Mohlenbrock, Public domain

Blunt spikerush is a small annual sedge (Eleocharis obtusa) that grows in wet ground such as riverbanks, moist forest floors and rice paddies. Its key to growing it is consistently moist to wet soil, since it is a wetland plant.

Family
Cyperaceae (Cyper family)
Grows as
Annual
Light
Full sun, Part shade
Water
Keep soil consistently wet or saturated; it tolerates shallow standing water.
Soil
Moist, fine-textured mud or loam with organic matter.
Temperature
Hardy in temperate climates; tolerates cool conditions and frost as an annual.
How easy
Easy
Native range
N. America, NE. Argentina
Climate
temperate

About

Eleocharis obtusa is a species of spikesedge known by the common name blunt spikerush. This plant is widely distributed across Canada and the United States, where it grows in wet areas such as riverbanks and moist forest floors. It is also a weed of rice paddies, especially when the rice plants are young sprouts. This is an annual spikesedge approaching half a meter in maximum height. It has many green cylindrical stems which are erect but weak and spongy. There may be thin, grasslike leaves toward the base of the plant, which are generally straw-colored. Atop each stem is a rounded or oblong spikelet containing at least ten flowers, each covered by an oval-shaped brown bract.

Other Eleocharis plants

Needle spikerush · Sharp Spike Sedge · Purple spikerush · Glades spikerush · Bolander's spikerush · Eleocharis brassii · Eleocharis caespitosissima · Algal Bulrush · Drooping Spikerush · Eleocharis dietrichiana · Chinese water chestnut · Jointed spikesedge

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Eleocharis obtusa by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.

The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.

Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.

Credits & terms

Identify a plant

Point at a leaf or flower and snap. One plant in frame works best.

Your photo
Starting camera…