Gorgeous Grass

Okay, so the title is misleading - this is a sedge, not a true grass, though it is grass-like. This beautiful plant is Carex pensylvanica, the Pennsylvania sedge.

The flowering tips are spectacular up close

It can host 36 species of caterpillars - quite a party!

Botanists teach amateur gardeners this useful mnemonic to help distinguish between grasses, sedges and rushes:

Sedges have edges,
Rushes are round,
Grasses have nodes from the top to the ground.

When ripe, the inflorescence looks more shaggy, like this