Southern Ontario Vascular Plant Species List - Conservation Ontario
Southern Ontario Vascular Plant Species List - Conservation Ontario
Southern Ontario Vascular Plant Species List - Conservation Ontario
You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles
YUMPU automatically turns print PDFs into web optimized ePapers that Google loves.
Introduction<br />
Previous versions of this publication were based on the <strong>Ontario</strong> <strong>Plant</strong> <strong>List</strong> (OPL),<br />
published by the <strong>Ontario</strong> Ministry of Natural Resources, 1998. There have been some<br />
notable changes in plant systematics and nomenclature over the past 15 years<br />
necessitating the need to update this species list. As a result of research associated with<br />
the publication of the Flora of North America (26 volumes in total) many taxonomic and<br />
nomenclatural updates have appeared in the literature.<br />
Concurrently, additional alien and native species have been observed and are now<br />
recorded as part of the flora of <strong>Ontario</strong>. With the release of this 3 rd edition of the <strong>Southern</strong><br />
<strong>Ontario</strong> <strong>Vascular</strong> <strong>Plant</strong> <strong>List</strong> there is a more harmonious linkage with the plant names<br />
listed in web based databases such as NatureServe, PLANTS, VASCAN, FOIBIS and<br />
ITIS.<br />
The main function of this document is to provide a list of standardized species codes<br />
which can be used to quickly record plant species. Although this list has been compiled<br />
for use with the provincial Vegetation Sampling Protocol (VSP) and Ecological Land<br />
Classification (ELC) programs, it can also be used by other researchers who are<br />
collecting field data in southern <strong>Ontario</strong>. These seven digit species codes are used by<br />
ecologists and biologists to speed up the time required to document plant species<br />
observed in the field.<br />
With over 3,400 plant species [including subspecies, varieties and hybrid forms] to<br />
choose from (Natural Heritage Information Centre web site, 2011) it can sometimes be a<br />
bit problematic when identifying plants in the field. In an effort to simplify this process,<br />
plant species normally not observed in southern <strong>Ontario</strong> have been removed. Excluded<br />
species are those found in northern <strong>Ontario</strong> (Boreal Forest Region, north to Hudson Bay)<br />
and western species which are normally restricted to the Kenora, Rainy River and<br />
Thunder Bay districts. This brings the number of species down to roughly 2,900 species.<br />
This is still a sizable number of species to work with, but it does reduce the number of<br />
species to below 3,000. As a consequence of using this list, the accuracy of our field data<br />
has improved, eliminating records for more northern species which are not normally<br />
found in southern <strong>Ontario</strong>.<br />
ii