| Author | L. | |
| Distribution | Throughout the coastal and tidewater regions, including nearly all counties around Albemarle and Pamlico sounds.
The natural range of this species is uncertain and controversial. It is native in Eurasia, and generally believed to be native at least to the northeastern Atlantic coast of North America, south perhaps to the Carolinas. However, it is certainly not native in the interior of the continent. Weakley (2018) states "Stuckey & Salamon (1987) considered T. angustifolia an invasive alien in North America, but later studies suggest that it was native at least in coastal areas of ne. and Mid-Atlantic North America, and has expanded its range westward in recent decades (Shih & Finkelstein 2008)". Weakley (2024) states also that "For now, we consider inland populations as non-native, and populations in tidal settings along the Atlantic Coast as of uncertain nativity"; his map also shows "provenance uncertain" for coastal NC and for all other coastal states. For now, the website editors will consider it as of natural occurrence in tidal waters; if it were an exotic species, it should have been collected in inland NC away from the coastal region. But, the SERNEC database lists only one such inland collection (Moore County from the 1970s). | |
| Abundance | Infrequent to locally common in its somewhat restricted NC range, found at the upper ends of embayed rivers as far inland as Hertford, Beaufort, and Jones counties. Locally abundant in Dare County oligohaline marshes and Outer Banks brackish marshes. | |
| Habitat | In NC, the species is restricted to brackish to more often oligohaline (slightly brackish) waters, of tidal marshes, ditches, and lake/pond margins. Most plants grow around the upper margins (less saline and less strongly tidal) of sounds and embayed rivers. |
| Phenology | Flowers from May to July, and fruits from June to November. | |
| Identification | This is a familiar coastal species, though not as widely seen or known as is T. latifolia. This cattail grows erectly, with the stem reaching 3-5 feet tall, and the leaves coming off the lower part of the stem, usually 10 or fewer leaves. Each leaf is dark green, up to 6 feet tall, but only about 1/5-1/4-inch wide. These leaves are strongly convex on the back, whereas the wider leaves of T. domingensis are only moderately convex on the back and are a more yellow-green in color. Each of these two species has the staminate spike separated on the stem from the lower pistillate spike; the widespread T. latifolia has these two spikes in contact. These spikes are brownish in color; however, this species has a narrow and dark brown pistillate spike whereas that of the taller and more robust T. domingensis has a wider orange-brown or rusty-brown pistillate spike. T. latifolia has much wider leaves that are yellow-green in color, easily separated from the very narrow and dark-green leaves of this species. | |
| Taxonomic Comments | None
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| Other Common Name(s) | None | |
| State Rank | S3? [S4] | |
| Global Rank | G5 | |
| State Status | | |
| US Status | | |
| USACE-agcp | OBL link |
| USACE-emp | OBL link |
