One of my common categories is a habitat type. In the location based posts, there are often several different habitats, depending on what’s at that particular site. Specific plant posts may only have one habitat, depending on how specialized that plant is.
- Aquatic – Plants actually living in water.
- Disturbed Habitat – Also called anthropocentric (man-made) habitat. These are areas altered by humans – the best example anyone has access to is roadsides (really, pretty much any landscape in a city). It also includes croplands, and would include forest margins, since we’re usually the cause for those.
- Mountain – I’m going to use this label for both sub-alpine and alpine habitats, because quite frankly, I’m more of an ambler than a hiker, and therefore unlikely to visit either. Sub-alpine is more common in New England – we don’t have the tallest mountains in the country (but they are older!), but there are true alpine environments out there for the hardier hiker. Alpine zones are only located in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont. You can get sub alpine examples in Massachusetts as well. Alpine is above treeline, but below permanent snow.
- Bog – A bog is a wetland that accumulates peat – deposits of dead, organic material.
- Ledges – From a habitat perspective, this is a rocky ridge or shelf that is probably projecting above the surrounding area. That means it’s subject to more wind and sun, and probably has a harsher habitat then the surrounding area. There is also less soil on the rock itself. This is comparable to the alpine habitats, but at a lower elevation, so has a wider variety of species. But it’s definitely distinct enough to merit its own category.
- Riparian – On the banks of a river.
- Salt Marsh – Coastal wetlands flooded by tides. By definition, plants here in the zone that floods must have some way of dealing with or tolerating salt water.
- Seashore – Dunes, beaches, or especially here in Maine, the rocky coast immediately on the shoreline. (Large parts of Maine don’t really do sand beaches.) Plants here shouldn’t have direct contact with salt water, but would be impacted by salt spray, and need to stand up to the winds and other harsh weather the ocean can throw at them.
- Wetland – An area saturated with water either seasonally, or permanently. I’m using it here for fresh water wetlands.
- Woodland – In a true forest. By definition, any under story plants in this kind of habitat would be shade specialists. I’ll often have this in posts with Disturbed Habitat, since it’s very hard to get far from forest margins in most of the area I’m in.