(Updated May 28, 2009).
The list of Toronto native plants got so huge I split it into separate posts by scientific name:
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Here are lists of all the plants mentioned in this blog.
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Hi Rosemary,
ReplyDeleteLooks like you've figured out a way to learn a lot!
i 1st started learning plant ID by sussing out downtown Toronto alley ways with an Audubon wildflower field guide myself :P. had a blast. Also ended up learning a lot of useful ID and info about weeds and invasive plants by doing it too.
you might also want to order this, or get it from the library: "Vascular Plants of Metropolitan Toronto". 1994. $10 from the Toronto Field Naturalists. http://www.torontofieldnaturalists.org/t-public.htm
It's a list of 1215 native or naturalized species recorded in TO. Includes 730 native. Also tells you their status (if their rare or extirpated fro example), which watershed, and natural areas in those watersheds, each has been recorded in.
also:
-if you click through this map http://www.fgca.net/conservation/native/default.aspx at the Forest Gene Conservation Association, it'll give you a list of trees and shrubs native to our eco-district too.
-the OMNR keeps a list of Ontario's vascular plant species here. http://nhic.mnr.gov.on.ca/MNR/nhic/species/listout.cfm?el=p&alpha=a
-SMURPHBOT: it's a list of plants in NE canada and US / it's beyond toronto and ontario, but it's useful for things like sorting out latin and common names: http://www.fes.uwaterloo.ca/ers/faculty/documents/Smurphbot.pdf
hope you'll enjoy some of these :)
Those are wonderful resources; thank you so much!
ReplyDeleteRosemary,
ReplyDeletehi. :)
i see the project continues, and that you're asking for corrections. i can only correct from second-hand knowledge -- from the resources created by the folks who've inventoried our natural heritage and researched historic records before us.
along with the sources i recommended above, there are other existing and already peer reviewed lists.
the TRCA has what i know to be the best / most authoritative list of the native and naturalized plants in the Toronto region. it's insightful too: includes other useful facts like the species their local conservation rank rarity/security; and whether or not they've been extirpated (e.g. butterfly milkweed is extirpated in toronto = the butterfly milkweed you saw in high park was re-introduced from seed source from somewhere else). Gavin Miller is the head botanist at the TRCA and the current curator of that list. you can also access it through local native plant nurseries.
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BTW: an excellent list of native prairie and meadow species for gardening or restoration in Toronto can be found online in the "Range" column of Appendix A of "Planting the Seed: A Guide to Establishing Prarie and Meadow Communities in Southern Ontario" http://www.on.ec.gc.ca/wildlife/docs/pdf/pts-prairie-e.pdf
All the resources i've recommended were created before i could even name 12 species native to our province. But just from knowing or reading about the work or bios of the contributors, i know that a lot of time, expertise, collaboration, historic and primary field research, inquiry, peer-review and resources went into creating these excellent and fundamental resources for us. i'm grateful we've all inherited them. if i'm ever lucky enough to discover a contribution or argue a discrepancy with them, i'll talk to their contributors and curators: most are alive and well, easy to contact and talk to.
great photos!
good luck!