Most common in wet meadows, marshes, edges of lakes, ponds, and streams, and other riparian areas. The surface may be hummocky or mounded and in trough shaped or flat floored valleys. Grows best on gentle slopes. Sometimes a dominant species in floating mats. Adapted to a variety of mineral and organic soils.
Many soils have large amounts of peat.
Other common soils may be sandy, silty, clayey, loamy, clayey loam, alluvial, or granitic. Soil pH tolerance 3.0-7.9. Compared with its waterside associates, occurs on some of the wettest sites. Common in recently formed beaver ponds and on sites with a high water table. Beaked sedge communities have little species diversity, and invasion is limited by the dense rhizome network.