Hey Moses---those aren't bulrushes! They are cat-tails.  This picture looks like the Everglades where cat-tails are getting out of control.  There are pythons in the Everglades---no place for floating babies!

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Sedges are the family Cyperaceae,  3500 species worldwide.

Rushes are the family Juncaceae, a small family of just 9 genera and 350 species, mostly in cool and temperate regions.

Grasses are the huge family Poaceae, 12,000 species worldwide.  See the Grass Biology page.

Most sedges and rushes prefer open, sunny, moist habitats, but there are renegade sedges in the shade, in the forest, by the sea, and in the hot sun-baked scrub as well.

Sedge flowers are tiny usually without perianths (sepal or petals).  (There are exceptions.) As with grasses,  you usually find just stamens and an ovary with 2 or 3 stigmas or styles.  Each flower is associated with an itsy bitsy scalelike bract,  the flower-bract units are arranged into spikelets without the elaborate system of glumes, lemmas, and paleas characteristic of grasses. Some sedges have bristles or 2-3 tiny paddle-shaped perianth parts (petal-like structures) in the position where petals would be found. (See the Sedge Biology Page)

Rush flowers uniquely have six petal-like structures surrounding each flower or fruit.  (Illustrated on the Sedge Biology page)

Sedges have historic roles in human culture:  papyrus, bulrushes, water-chestnuts, weeds (such as the infamous Yellow Nutsedge and Purple Nutsedge),  garden ornamentals (some, such as Papyrus and Umbrellasedge escaping as invasive exotics).  The Rush Juncus effusus is sometimes marketed as a garden ornamental.

In Florida, of course, the most important sedge is Sawgrass.