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Natural Perspective

Appendix -- Plant Classification

(Last modified: 4 May 2015)

You will need a viewer which understands HTML tables in order to see this properly. If the following doesn't look very intelligable, your viewer probably doesn't support tables...

Please see the plant page for a discussion of the different classification methods.

The correlation between various methods of classifying plants.

Phylum

Tissue Structure

"Seed" Structure

Stature

Bryophyta
(mosses)

Non-vascular
(Bryophytes)

Spore Producers

Moss-like

Psilophyta
whisk ferns

Vascular Plants
(Tracheophytes)

Fern- and Tree-like

Lycopodophyta
(club ferns)

Sphenophyta
(horsetails)

Filicinophyta
(ferns)

Cycadophyta
(cycads)

Naked seeds
(Gymnosperms)

Ginkophyta
(Ginkoes)

Tree-like

Coniferophyta
(conifers)

Tree- and shrub-like

Gnetophyta
(??)

*Angiospermophyta*
(flowering plants)
Dicotyledons (two seed-leaves)
Monocotyledons (single seed-leaf)

Covered seeds
(Angiosperms)

Tree-, shrub-, vine-, and herb-like

Note that some of the stature classifications are rather arbitrary. For example, a horsetail probably looks more like a herbacious plant than a fern and cycads may look more like small palms than ferns. Some tropical ferns can be quite tall, resembling trees.

[Home] [Contents] [Fungi] [Plantae] [Animalia] [Protoctista] [Species Index]

Credits:: Collaboration and inspiration thanks to Susan Kornfeld; Early PhotoCD scans by Alpha CD Imaging, Menlo Park, CA; Special thanks to Claire Doyle Ragin for scanning some early photos; Internet service by Pair Networks