Flora

Topic

Topic pages summarize knowledge and resources within a subject area

Recent Topic Edits

• Deciduous Canopy
• Conifer Canopy
• Alnus
• Integrated Floodplain Management

Salish Sea References

• Watershed Characterization Mapper
• The Encyclopedia of Puget Sound
• PRISM Project Search
• Washington Coastal Atlas
• WDFW's Salmonscape Map

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Flora is a sub-category of Vegetation used to organize information about specific plant species. Floral Biodiversity contributes to faunal biodiversity. Understanding the detailied characteristics of plant species enables Revegetation. Revegetation is particularly important in management of Aquatic Buffers. Landform is often defined by a mosaic of Hydrology, and also the Ecosystem processes of a Site which strongly controls the pattern Vegetation. Forestry techniques focused on wood production often undermine understory biodiveristy. Flora pages typically consider species at the genus level, except where species are very divergent.

Notes

• The platform has just begun to include flora information.
• We have no structured data to allow for complex searches of species. At this point in type, we can use custome lists of function groups or guilds to organize flora.
• The Ecosystem Guild has authored a lowland Puget Sound plant list in spreadhseet format and is seeking partners.*
• USDA Plants Database is a searchable and downloadable national database with many different classifications including USACE wetland indicator codes
• Franklin & Dyrness 1988 natural vegetation oregon washington is the classic textbook on the forest types of the Salish Sea and Columbia Basin
• Kruckeberg 1991 natural history puget sound is the classic synthesis with a chapters describing vegetation
• Klinka et al 1989 indicator plants British Columbia is an out-of-print but critical body of work describing and classifying species-habitat relationships.
• Chappell 2004 upland plan associations puget trough provides a synthesis of extensive field work in lowland Puget Sound.

Functional Groups or Guilds

Most people who become deeply involved in native plant species develop a familiarity with both individual species, and develop a sense of similar species that play similar roles in forming patterns of Vegetation. Often different species with a similar form will occupy a gradient from wet to dry. This approach does not approach the vast biodiveristy present in Wetlands. It also ignores the variety of Prairie and Oak Woodland systems maintained by intensive Cultural Burning.

Trees

• Conifer Canopy describes the four common conifer trees that form the prevalent forest canopy in our bioregion.
• Deciduous Canopy includes four species of large deciduous tree that establish often on moist sites or following flood disturbance, or where seed rain is strong.
• Understory Trees are describes four species that are the most common and predominant specise that define the understory of upland forest.

Shrubs

• The Groundcover Matrix describes four very common species that the prevelant upland groundcover in most forests.
• The Rhizomatous Shrubs are a guild of shrubs that spread with underground roots and range from dry forest to wetland.
• Large Shrubs a set of large shrubs that are common and structurally important elements of the forest.
• The Wetland Shrubs are a group of common shrubs that live on ground too wet for forest, and form Wetland Shrub Swamp.
• Dryland Shrubs are a set of uncommon shrubs that are mostly associated with dry sunny sites.

Herbaceous

• The Lilies a collection of species in the lily family are found in diverse and mature understories.
• The Saxifrage Sisters a group of four relatively common forms are similar in form and found in many forest understories.
• Big Forbs a set of forbs are big and have rhizomes
• Ephemerals are species that tend to germinate in winter drop seed by early summer.
• Woodland Grasses and Sedges that play a minor role in our tree-dominated landscape.

Moisture Gradients

In our bioregion, as the duration of soil moisture increases, trees and finally shurbs are unable to survive, leaving emergent Wetlands. As the duration and intensity of Drought increases, different species are unable to survive.

Fire-Based Ecosystems

Wildfire which depending on your framing could also encompass Cultural Burning can affect vegetation. Some species are adapted to and dependant on periodic burning, and the frequency, intensity, and patchiness of fire can affect flora.

• Prairie and Oak Woodland is a vegetation sustained by Cultural Burning
• The boundary between Shrub Steppe and Dry Forest is defined by soil, drought, and fire frequency.

Flora Topics

10 Topics in Flora

Alnus  •  Conifer Canopy  •  Cornus sericea  •  Deciduous Canopy  •  Fallopia japonica (knotweed)  •  Fraxinus  •  Phalaris arundinacea (reed canarygrass)  •  Quercus  •  Thuja  •  Urtica dioica