Black needlerush (Juncus roemerianus) is the most common plant in Sapelo saltmarshes after smooth cordgrass. It has terete (rounded), sharply pointed leaf blades all of which have their leaf-sheath attachments at the sediment surface; there is no aerial stem except for the few flowering shoots. It is a clonal plant like smooth cordgrass, but it is a "phalanx" competitor, rather than a "guerilla" competitor like cordgrass. It is a C3 plant (photosynthetic pathway -- smooth cordgrass is C4), and is mycorrhizal, whereas smooth cordgrass is not. The leaf blades of black needlerush exist as standing-decaying entities for long periods (some as long as 2 years -- note the bleached-white blades in the foreground -- these are the oldest). Jan and Brigitte Kohlmeyer have virtually fully described the fungal-decomposer flora of standing-decaying blades of black needlerush, a great gift to the microbial ecologists who will choose this system for study. There are many more species in the black-needlerush fungal community than in the smooth-cordgrass fungal community, but no one knows why. See Newell SY. 2001. Fungal biomass and productivity in standing-decaying leaves of black needlerush (Juncus roemerianus). Mar. Freshwater Res. 52:249-255.