Tips and Resources for Identifying Plants

Backyard Ecology

We’ve all been there. We are walking in the woods, in a field, along a creek bank, around our property, or around the local park and we stumble upon an interesting plant. It isn’t one that we know and we immediately begin to wonder, “what is that?”

It’s a simple question that holds so much potential because once we know what the plant is, we can find out more about it. The plants we find growing in a location can also help tell fascinating stories about the history of that area, provide hints as to the types of animals or even other plants that might also be found there, and so much more. But it all starts with being able to accurately identify the plant.

In today’s episode, I am joined by my husband, Anthony Trimboli. Anthony and I discuss some of the reasons why identifying plants you find can be important and some of the resources you can use for identifying plants (including pros and cons of each resource). We also share some of the things we look at when we are identifying plants.

To make it easier for you to refer back to particular parts of the podcast, here is a rough outline of our conversation and the times we start discussing each topic.

• Importance of identifying plants: 1:34
• Apps: 5:05
• Field guides: 18:45
• Dichotomous keys: 28:00
• Building your own knowledge: 35:53
• Summary: 1:01:46

Links

• Woody Plants in Winter: A Manual of Common Trees and Shrubs in Winter in the Northeastern United States and Southeastern Canada:https://amzn.to/3q50Yxf *
• Flora of the Southeastern United States by Alan Weakley: https://ncbg.unc.edu/research/unc-herbarium/flora-request/
• Shannon and Anthony’s upcoming classes / workshops: https://shannontrimboli.com/events/category/classes/
• Backyard Ecology Website: https://backyardecology.net
• Backyard Ecology YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/backyardecology
• Backyard Ecology Blog: https://www.backyardecology.net/blog/
• Backyard Ecology Patreon page: https://www.patreon.com/backyardecology
• Subscribe to Backyard Ecology emails: https://www.backyardecology.net/subscribe/

Episode image:

• Woodland sunflower
• Photo credit: USFWS, public domain