Vascular Plants
The vascular plants are the subset of plants that have vascular/connective tissue - xylem and phloem - that help to carry water, nutrients, and other resources from one part of the plant to another. Vascular plants consist of both woody species and non-woody ones. Trees, shrubs, and woody vines are in the first grouping, whereas herbaceous vines, graminoids (grasses, sedges, and rushes), and “forbs” (all other herbaceous plants that include “wildflowers”) comprise the second grouping.
As one might expect, there is a huge number of vascular plant species worldwide, with estimates around 300,000 species being the average. Vascular species flora in a given region, such as a state, need to be broken down into native species and non-native ones, as many “foreign” species escape from cultivation and become a part of the flora of the state. In North Carolina, there is a rough tally of at least 2,900 species that are believed to be native to the state, and 1,000 or more that are known “exotics” or probable exotics. In North Carolina, there are hundreds of graminoid species, as grasses and sedges are very widespread.
Plant study is a very popular activity in the state, especially the observation and photography of various wildflowers. On a given hike or woodland walk, one can see many dozens of plant species. Most outdoor enthusiasts have one to many field guides of trees, shrubs, and wildflowers, even if they cannot identify most of the species.
That is why the Vascular Plants of North Carolina website is so very important to the public. The website has full species accounts of all roughly 4,000 species in the state, with information on identification of them. Each species has a county range map to help show where a given species is found. Photos of many species are on the accounts, though each account has a link to Google Images so that the user can view photos on that search engine.