Very good Florida only database

Today searching for information on plants I have, but don't know enough about, I found the following excellent South Florida only database. It covers from Charolette, Glades and Martin Counties south through the keys.

Their mission "The Institute for Regional Conservation (IRC) is dedicated to the protection, restoration, and long-term management of biodiversity on a regional basis, and to the prevention of regional extinctions of rare plants, animals and ecosystems."

They provide volumes of information running from Natives for your Neighborhood, Publications & Reports, Restoring South Florida's Native Plant Heritage, and the Floristic Inventory of South Florida Database Online.

This database list plants by the following methods;

Plants of South Florida A list of all the taxa reported for South Florida. This includes the 10 counties in South Florida.

Plants by Conservation Area A list of all the taxa reported for a specific Conservation Area. There are 344 conservation areas in South Florida.

Plants by County A list of all the taxa reported for a specific County.

Plants by Habitat A list of all the taxa reported for a specific Habitat.

References A list of all the references used to compile the Floristic Inventory of South Florida Database.

Submit Data You can submit your data to The Institute for Regional Conservation.

Quick Search You can quickly search the database by scientific name or common name.

Advanced Search Using the advanced search options you can produce a list of taxa by a variety of criteria including native status, habit, and plant family.

Edit my profile You can modify your user settings.

The only requirement is registration, which requires a valid email address and your contact information. Their web site is http://www.regionalconservation.org/ircs/index.asp

Enjoy it!

Art

Art, that's a great web site. I've used it many times to Id plants and to just look around. Anybody interested in native habitats can find tons of useful information there.

Val

Too bad that site doesn't recognize that there's another half of the state.


For those of you who do NOT live in South Florida, I highly recommend www.floridata.com.

Thanks, Art! I sure can use that site!

Dogzilla - I too wish us northerners would have a better site, but Floridata is a great resource. Hope all is well and you had a good New Year - brace yourself for this weekend - got a feeling it is going to be a cold one. UGH!

I posted the original site because of my interest in growing natives. Since all natives won't grow here in zone 10, I use this site to determine what I should be looking for that will grow locally.

I use other Florida data base sites to resolve other problems I have. With that in mind, here are some good data bases for everyone in Florida, and those of you that wish you were here.

One of the best data bases is a from a private company, Biological Research Associates, (environmental consultants.) Their data base is huge and easy to use. You enter a single word and tap enter, or you can browse by alphabetical listings. The site features excellent pictures and other links to your search plant. http://www.biologicalresearch.com/Plants/

The University of South Florida (a misnomer since it's in Tampa) has an excellent database. "The Atlas of Florida Vascular Plants is a joint effort by the Institute of Systemic Botany , the University of South Florida and the Florida Center for Community Design + Research to provide users with a comprehensive searchable database of vascular plants in the State of Florida."
You can browse by List of Plants by County, Browse list of plants, or use their advanced search tool. However Scientific names are required. http://plantatlas.usf.edu/default.asp

If looking to buy Florida Natives, the Association of Florida Native Nurseries has a good data base. You can find Wholesale Sources for a specific plant by plant scientific name, by plant common name or find Wholesale Sources by company name by area (region of Florida or other state). You can find Retail Sellers for a Specific Plant by plant scientific name or plant common name. http://www.afnn.org/search_afnn.asp?n=22

If looking for Florida Wildflowers, you can go to the Florida Wildflowers page and select the Wildflower Index box. This will bring up a complete listing (theirs) of Florida wildflowers by family. You can use your browers (edit) (find) feature to find what you are looking for on the page. They don't have a search feature. They have good pictures, but not a lot of technical information on the flowers. http://www.flwildflowers.com/index.html

One of my favorites to find unusual plants is a commercial retail and mail order company, our S Fl Galloping Gardeners Group frequently visit, Top Tropicals. This company is run by a Russian couple that setteled here in Fort Lauderdale (smart idea.) I suggest using the Plant Catalog search option, which is close to the top of the page. Very good pictures (taken by his wife on their frequent buying trips) and excellent descriptions of their plants. This site is a pleasure to browse through if you are into unusual plants.
http://toptropicals.com/

There you go, something for everyone in Florida. For those of you that are braving out another cold dreary winter somewhere up north, put on a tank top and a pair of shorts and one of those funky hats you wear in the summer time and pretend you are visiting sunny Florida for a few days while you browse these sites and enjoy yourselves for a few hours.

Art

Wow Art! Thanks for all of the above information! You've done quite a bit of research on our area.

:)

Hi Mary,
Not really, I use these sites all the time. I am just sharing with those of you "up North".
I wasn't rubbing it in with the data base from Institute for Regional Conservation (IRC), but I may have implied it the way I wrote my message.
My original message was not meant to "rub it in", I had just found the site and was so tickled with it, I just had to share it with anyone interested.

Art

Thanks art! I use a lot of those resources pretty frequently too, but you just turned me on to a couple I wasn't previously aware of.

I keep telling people that Florida is really three states in one, but nobody outside this state believes me.

Dogzilla, I know what you mean with the three states in one. I often go to Key West with my wife. You look on the map and it looks close, but it's a five hour trip. Going the other way, to get to J-ville again another five hour trip. It's a big place, with something for everyone.

Glad you found a data base that was helpfull.

I love it here.

Art

Another very interesting "data base" type of site I found this morning.
I was doing research on Crapemyrtle lagerstroemia and went to this data base because Google indicated they had an area devoted to this plant. While there I visited several area's and found the information complete, with excellent pictures and with the kind of layout that makes navigating the site easy. It's hard to believe it's a US Government site. It's the site of the US National Arboretum. The link is to the front page site map. http://www.usna.usda.gov/SiteMap_USNA.html

I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

Art