S. heros is found in northern Mexico and the southwestern United States, from New Mexico and Arizona in the west to Arkansas, Missouri, and Louisiana in the east. Although this species is commonly referred to as the "giant desert centipede" because of its presence in the Sonoran Desert and other arid habitats, S. heros is also found in rocky woodland areas, such as in Arkansas. It remains underground on warm days, emerging in cloudy weather.


Since at least the time of Theophrastus in ancient Greece, this plant has been known for medicinal and culinary uses. Although it has been cultivated at times, currently most of the plant which is consumed comes from harvesting wild plants. It is very popular in almost every province of Spain, where it is usually eaten in stews during spring. It is also used in salads and soups, and it is served with scrambled eggs in Extremadura and Andalusia, Spain, where it is called tagarnina. In the sixteenth century in Salamanca, the washed young plants used to be eaten with their root, either raw or in stews with meat.
In parts of southern Italy, the leaves are only gathered during Holy Week, after which they are used to bake a meat pie to be eaten on Easter.


The silver sweep (Scorpis lineolata), also known as the false pompano, sweep, trumps or windawindawi,  is a species of marine ray-finned fish from the subfamily Scorpidinae of the sea chub family Kyphosidae. It is native to the southwestern Pacific Ocean from Australia to New Zealand.


The silver sweep is found in the southwestern Pacific Ocean off Australia and New Zealand. In Australia it is found from Moreton Bay in Queensland south to Tasmania and west as far as Victor Harbor, South Australia. It is also found in the Tasman Sea around Lord Howe Island and Norfolk Island. Silver sweep are a common fish on the east coast of Australia, particularly in New South Wales. In  New Zealand silver sweep are distributed around the coast of the North Island.


Securigera varia (synonym Coronilla varia), commonly known as crownvetch or purple crown vetch, is a low-growing legume vine. It is native to Africa, Asia and Europe and is commonly used throughout the United States and Canada for erosion control, roadside planting and soil rehabilitation. It has become an invasive species in many states of the US.
Crownvetch grows 1 to 2 feet tall and bears small clusters of 1/2-inch pink and white flowers from early summer to late fall. The variety Penngift produces mounds of pink flowers. Crownvetch is a tough, aggressive spreading plant that will crowd out its neighbors in a show garden but is well suited to a sunny bank, where it will grow for decades with little to no fertilizing, mowing, or weeding since the thick foliage prevents weeds from growing amid it. Its deep, tenacious, complex root system and thick, fern-like leaves provide excellent erosion control where it is used as a ground cover. However, this legume has a very long germination period of about 6 months and does not create full coverage until two or three years later.


Sedum ternatum is the most widespread native Sedum species in eastern North America, commonly known as woodland stonecrop.  It has white flowers, blooming April to May.  This shade-tolerant species is often found in the forest understory, although it can also grow in sunnier locations when sufficient moisture is present. Its common name of "stonecrop" evokes its ability to thrive atop boulders, where its succulent leaves help it to retain moisture in shallow soil. It adapts well to garden use.
Sedum ternatum is native to much of the eastern United States, as far west as Arkansas and Iowa, south down the Appalachian Mountains, and north to near the Canada–United States border.
Sedum ternatum can be distinguished from other sedums, native and cultivated, which are commonly found in the United States by the white flowers with four (not five) petals, and by the leaves in whorls of three, whence the species name.  The plant flowers for about a month in late spring to early summer.


The ovenbird (Seiurus aurocapilla) is a small songbird of the New World warbler family (Parulidae). This migratory bird breeds in eastern North America and winters in Central America, many Caribbean islands, Florida and northern Venezuela.


The calliope hummingbird (/kəˈlaɪ.əpi/ kə-LY-ə-pee; Selasphorus calliope) is the smallest bird native to the United States and Canada. It has a western breeding range mainly from California to British Columbia, and migrates to the Southwestern United States, Mexico, and Central America for its wintering grounds. It was previously considered the only member of the genus Stellula, but recent evidence suggests placement in the genus Selasphorus. This bird was named after the Greek muse Calliope. The former genus name means "little star".


The breeding habitat of calliope hummingbird is varied among open shrub habitats and altitudes. Nesting usually occurs at higher altitudes in the Rocky Mountains. Nests have been observed from as low as 600 ft (180 m) in Oregon and Washington elevation to the tree line at over 11,000 ft (3,400 m). In Montana, the minimum elevation observed for breeding is 1,200 m (3,900 ft). Open montane forest, mountain meadows, and willow and alder thickets may variously serve as breeding grounds. During migration and winter, they also occur in chaparral, lowland brushy areas, deserts and semi-desert regions. They nest in western North America from southern British Columbia and Alberta south to Colorado and southern California. During spring and summer, they move, mainly through Arizona and New Mexico and northern Mexico, to winter in southwestern Mexico as well as in Guatemala and Belize.


The broad-tailed hummingbird (Selasphorus platycercus) is a medium-sized hummingbird species found in highland regions from western United States and Western Canada to Mexico and Guatemala.


This species exhibits partial migration, depending on the northern range during winter. The specific migratory route used by the broad-tailed hummingbird remains unknown, although migrating populations winter in southern Mexico or Guatemala and return to their breeding area in spring. Males arrive first to the breeding range, followed by breeding females. Some populations of the broad-tailed hummingbird in southern Mexico and Guatemala do not migrate, a variation in behavior called "sedentary".


The northern plains gray langur is listed as least concern on the IUCN Red List, it is threatened by habitat loss. The northern plains gray langur adapts to many habitats and the Hindu religion considers the northern plains gray langur to be sacred.  Hence it has large population within India, including within towns and cities.  It is subject to some threats, including road kill, attacks by dogs, forest fires and diseases caught from domestic animals.  It is sometimes hunted for food, especially within the states of Odisha and Andhra Pradesh and is sometimes killed by humans to prevent it from raiding crops.
 Captive gray langurs are used in Delhi to scare off rhesus macaques, which steal from and sometimes attack people.


Senecio vulgaris is considered to be native to Europe, northern Asia, and parts of North Africa. Its further distribution is less clear. The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), Natural Resources Conservation Service Plants Profile Database considers it to be native to all 50 of the United States of America, Canada, Greenland, Saint Pierre and Miquelon, the same USDA through the Germplasm Resources Information Network (GRIN) considers it to be native only to parts of Afro-Eurasia. The Integrated Taxonomic Information System Organization (ITIS), a partnership among many United States federal government departments and agencies states that the species has been introduced to the 50 United States, and the online journal Flora of North America calls it "probably introduced" to areas north of Mexico. Individual research groups claim it is not native to areas they oversee: Florida, Washington, Wisconsin, Saskatchewan, British Columbia, Missouri. The United States Geological Survey reports that common groundsel is exotic to all 50 states and all Canadian provinces with the exception of Georgia, Kentucky, Massachusetts, and Labrador.


Senna didymobotrya is a species of flowering plant in the legume family known by the common names African senna, popcorn senna, candelabra tree, and peanut butter cassia. It is native to Africa, where it can be found across the continent in several types of habitat.
It has been introduced to many other parts of the world for use as an ornamental plant, a cover crop and a leguminous green manure. In some places it is now naturalized in the wild, for example, in parts of Indonesia, Australia, Mexico, and the United States in California, Florida, and Hawaii.


Coast redwood is one of the most valuable timber species in the lumbering industry. In California, 3,640 km² (899,000 acres) of redwood forest are logged, virtually all of it second growth. Though many entities have existed in the cutting and management of redwoods, perhaps none has had a more storied role than the Pacific Lumber Company (1863–2008) of Humboldt County, California, where it owned and managed over 810 km² (200,000 acres) of forests, primarily redwood. Coast redwood lumber is highly valued for its beauty, light weight, and resistance to decay. Its lack of resin makes it absorb water and resist fire.
P.H. Shaughnessy, Chief Engineer of the San Francisco Fire Department wrote:
In the recent great fire of San Francisco, that began April 18th, 1906, we succeeded in finally stopping it in nearly all directions where the unburned buildings were almost entirely of frame construction, and if the exterior finish of these buildings had not been of redwood lumber, I am satisfied that the area of the burned district would have been greatly extended.
Because of its impressive resistance to decay, redwood was extensively used for railroad ties and trestles throughout California. Many of the old ties have been recycled for use in gardens as borders, steps, house beams, etc. Redwood burls are used in the production of table tops, veneers, and turned goods.
The Yurok people, who occupied the region before European settlement, regularly burned off ground cover in redwood forests to bolster tanoak populations from which they harvested acorns, to maintain forest openings, and to boost populations of useful plant species such as those for medicine or basketmaking.
Extensive logging of redwoods began in the early nineteenth century. The trees were felled by ax and saw onto beds of tree limbs and shrubs to cushion their fall. Stripped of their bark, the logs were transported to mills or waterways by oxen or horse. Loggers then burned the accumulated tree limbs, shrubs, and bark. The repeated fires favored secondary forests of primarily redwoods as redwood seedlings sprout readily in burned areas. The introduction of steam engines let crews drag logs through long skid trails to nearby railroads, furthering the reach of loggers beyond the land nearby rivers previously used to transport trees. This method of harvesting, however, disturbed large amounts of soil, producing secondary-growth forests of species other than redwood such as Douglas-fir, grand fir, and western hemlock. After World War II, trucks and tractors gradually replaced steam engines, giving rise to two harvesting approaches: clearcutting and selection harvesting. Clearcutting involved felling all the trees in a particular area. It was encouraged by tax laws that exempted all standing timber from taxation if 70% of trees in the area were harvested. Selection logging, by contrast, called for the removal 25% to 50% of mature trees in the hopes that the remaining trees would allow for future growth and reseeding. This method, however, encouraged growth of other tree species, converting redwood forests into mixed forests of redwood, grand fir, Sitka spruce, and western hemlock. Moreover, the trees left standing were often felled by windthrow; that is, they were often blown over by the wind.
The coast redwood is naturalized in New Zealand, notably at Whakarewarewa Forest, Rotorua. Redwood has been grown in New Zealand plantations for more than 100 years, and those planted in New Zealand have higher growth rates than those in California, mainly because of even rainfall distribution through the year.
Other areas of successful cultivation outside of the native range include Great Britain, Italy, Portugal, Haida Gwaii, middle elevations of Hawaii, Hogsback in South Africa, the Knysna Afromontane forests in the Western Cape, Grootvadersbosch Forest Reserve near Swellendam, South Africa and the Tokai Arboretum on the slopes of Table Mountain above Cape Town, a small area in central Mexico (Jilotepec), and the southeastern United States from eastern Texas to Maryland. It also does well in the Pacific Northwest (Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia), far north of its northernmost native range in southwestern Oregon. Coast redwood trees were used in a display at Rockefeller Center and then given to Longhouse Reserve in East Hampton, Long Island, New York, and these have now been living there for over twenty years and have survived at 2 °F (−17 °C).
This fast-growing tree can be grown as an ornamental specimen in those large parks and gardens that can accommodate its massive size. It has gained the Royal Horticultural Society's Award of Garden Merit.


Indigenous names are reported to include: tala or  talimushi ("palmetto's uncle") in Choctaw; cani (Timucua); ta ́:la (Koasati); taalachoba ("big palm", Alabama); ta:laɬ a ́ kko ("big palm", Creek); talco ́:bˆı ("big palm", Mikasuki); and guana (Taino, possibly). Saw palmetto fibers have been found among materials from indigenous people as far north as Wisconsin and New York, strongly suggesting this material was widely traded prior to European contact. The leaves are used for thatching by several indigenous groups, so commonly that a location in Alachua County, Florida, is named Kanapaha ("palm house"). The fruit may have been used to treat an unclear form of fish poisoning by the Seminoles and Bahamians.


The white-browed scrubwren was originally described by naturalists Nicholas Aylward Vigors and Thomas Horsfield in 1827. The specific epithet frontalis derived from the Latin frons "eyebrow". It is now divided into two subspecies:
S. f. frontalis, known as the white-browed scrubwren, is found in coastal eastern Australia from the New South Wales-Queensland border round to Adelaide in South Australia.
S. f. laevigaster, known as the buff-breasted scrubwren, is found in coastal Queensland from the New South Wales border north to the Atherton Tableland.
S. humilis, the Tasmanian scrubwren, is found in Tasmania and Bass Strait islands and was formerly considered a subspecies of the white-browed scrubwren. It is larger at 13.5 cm long and lays larger eggs.
S. maculatus, known as the spotted scrubwren, occurs in coastal southern Australia, from Kangaroo Island and Adelaide westwards to Shark Bay in Western Australia. It is known to intergrade with the nominate subspecies where their ranges overlap. Genetic analysis in a 2018 study of the family found that this taxon was more divergent from S. f. frontalis than the Tasmanian or Atherton scrubwrens and hence proposed its reclassification as a species. It was reclassfied as a species in 2019.


The grass has been introduced to many areas, often as an ornamental. It is widespread in the Pacific Islands. It has become an invasive plant on Lord Howe Island, Norfolk Island, Rapa Nui, Fiji, and the Solomon Islands, and in Samoa and Hawaii. It is also invasive in New Zealand and Queensland.
The grass is robust and spreads via rhizome and seed banks, forming monotypic stands. It is a tall plant with wide leaves that shade out other vegetation. The rampant feral pigs of Hawaii facilitate its spread there by uprooting the surrounding plants while feeding on its thick stems. It is also spread by seed-eating birds.
This species is host to the fungi Cercospora setariae and Phacellium paspali.


The German naturalist Johann Friedrich Gmelin described the black-throated blue warbler in 1789. Its species name is the Latin adjective caerulescens meaning "turning blue".
The black-throated blue warbler is one of the New World warblers or wood-warblers in the family Parulidae. This species was originally placed under the genus Dendroica. It was recently adjusted to be a member of genus Setophaga along with all other members of the genus Dendroica, based on the findings from a recent phylogenetic analysis of mitochondrial DNA and nuclear DNA in 2010. The old genus Dendroica was then deleted. Within the genus, it appears to have no particularly close relatives.
The species breeds in North America and winters in the Caribbean. Some studies have observed significant differences in terms of migratory behavior and plumage color between northern and southern populations within the breeding range. The northern population mainly winters in the western Caribbean (Cuba and Jamaica) while the southern population usually spends the winter on eastern islands (Hispaniola and Puerto Rico). Moreover, males in the southern population have darker plumage than those in the northern population. These differences have led biologists to consider them as separate subspecies. However, a recent study in the United States reveals no significant genetic differentiation between northern (samples from Michigan, New Hampshire and New York states) and southern populations (sample from North Carolina). The study results actually show a recent population expansion from a single glacial refugium, therefore the current populations are homogeneous in terms of genetics. The differentiation that is observed between the northern and southern populations should have occurred quite recently.


Bay-breasted warblers breed in the boreal spruce-fir forests of eastern and central Canada, as well as the extreme northern United States. The species winters in the wet lowland forests of northeastern South America, the Caribbean, and southern Central America, and may be seen during spring and fall migration across the eastern half of the United States in a variety of vegetative communities. Many individuals cross the Gulf of Mexico on their long-distance migration, although some travel north and south along the Mexican shore.


The cerulean warbler's preferred summer habitat consists of large, unfragmented mature deciduous hardwood forests. Nesting takes place in the top canopy, often above heights of 30 m (98 ft), and territories are typically about 2 ha (4.9 acres). Foraging is done throughout the mid to high canopy. Generally, to support a population of cerulean warblers, a forested area of greater than 700 ha (1,700 acres) is required. Riparian areas are commonly selected.
The breeding range extends from southern Tennessee to southern Ontario, and is bounded in the east by the Atlantic Ocean and on the west by the Great Plains. The majority of the population breeds in forests of the Appalachian mountains, with smaller numbers in forests throughout the United States and Canada. Historically, the cerulean warbler was common to abundant as far south as Alabama and Mississippi, but loss of habitat in these southern regions has caused the centre of its breeding range to shift northwards.
The cerulean warbler migrates distances of over 5,000 km (3,100 mi) between its breeding and non-breeding ranges. In the spring, it takes an overland route through Central America, passing over water only to cross the Gulf of Mexico at the Yucatán Peninsula. In the autumn, it may overfly the Caribbean Sea, crossing from Florida to Cuba onto continental South America. Migration takes from 40–70 days; much of this time is made up of stopovers, where birds will remain at one individual location for 2–18 days.
The non-breedingrange covers a broad area of northern South America, and extends southwards along the Andes mountains. Individuals have been found as far south as Bolivia, while in the north it is often found throughout Colombia and Venezuela. The cerulean warbler prefers tall forest; its occurrence is therefore strongly correlated with the presence of old-growth subtropical forests or shade coffee plantations. It is found at altitudes of 500–2,000 m (1,600–6,600 ft) in its non-breeding range.
The cerulean warbler has been recorded as a vagrant to Iceland. It has also been recorded in Brazil, far outside of its range.


The cerulean warbler forages throughout the forest canopy, predominantly at middle to top layers. It hops from branch to branch, gleaning small soft-bodied insects from leaves and twigs. In the non-breeding season, it may also glean insects from flowers. Its preferred prey consists of butterfly and moth (lepidopteran larvae), though it supplements its diet with winged insects. In its non-breeding range, it preferentially forages on trees of the genus Inga.
Foraging is vertically segregated; males tend to forage at somewhat higher elevations in the canopy than females. The difference in height average is about 2 m (6.6 ft). They stay with mixed-species flocks as they forage, sharing spaces with species such as the American redstart (Setophaga ruticilla), Blackburnian warbler, and Tennessee warbler (Leiothlypis peregrina). The other species forage at different heights and substrates, preventing competition. At the high elevations and relatively sparser vegetation that the cerulean warbler prefers, the gleaning technique it uses is more effective than aerial maneouvreing. Foraging locations tend to be lower than nest placements.


Golden-cheeked warblers will only remain in Texas for the breeding season, from March to June. They will migrate with other songbird species along Mexico's Sierra Madre Oriental. By the first week of March, the warblers will return to Texas to breed. During the winter season (November–February), warblers will travel to Guatemala, Nicaragua, Honduras, and Mexico.


The yellow-rumped warbler's migratory behaviors vary greatly across different groups and subspecies. Some individuals in Central America, such as in Mexico and Guatemala, migrate only limitedly or do not migrate at all; while individuals in the northern parts of the continent may either choose to migrate all the way towards Central America or winter near their breeding area along the Pacific Coast of the U.S. The species's migratory behaviors are generally nocturnal, as individuals tend to travel at night; accordingly, during the yellow-rumped warbler's migration in spring, it often relies on skylight polarization as a way to navigate and orient at dusk. The general direction of its migratory route maintains southwards during winter, as more individuals are present in Central America and southern parts of North America during the season, while less are observed in the north. Every year, fall migration usually takes place from September to November, spring migration from April to May, and the species known to depart from its winter habitats from March to April. Research shows that before migration, the yellow-rumped warbler intentionally gains weight and accrues more fat in its body: as a preparation for this energy-intensive activity, it consumes more food than other times for the purpose of increasing net energy intake from feeding, along with a refined diet that gives priority to food that supplies more energy.


The magnolia warbler is found in the northern parts of some Midwestern states and the very northeastern parts of the US, with states such as Minnesota and Wisconsin comprising its southernmost boundaries. However, it is mostly found across the northern parts of Canada, such as in Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Ontario, and Quebec. During the winter, the warbler migrates through the eastern half of the United States to southern Mexico and Central America. The warbler breeds in dense forests, where it will most likely be found among the branches of young, densely packed, coniferous trees. The magnolia warbler migrates to the warmer south in the winter, wintering in southeastern Mexico, Panama, and parts of the Caribbean. In migration it passes through the eastern part of the United States as far west as Oklahoma and Kansas. During migration season, the magnolia warbler can be found in various types of woodlands.


The black-throated gray warbler breeds in western North America, its range extending from southwestern British Columbia along the Pacific coast to northern Baja California, and east to New Mexico and southern Montana. It winters mostly in Mexico, from southern Baja California to Oaxaca state. It has spread into parts of Wyoming and Montana only recently, as Juniperus osteosperma has expanded its range due to a warming climate. Vagrants have been recorded across eastern North America and in Cuba.
The black-throated gray warbler breeds in open coniferous and mixed forest with a brushy understory, in dry open oak forests, and in chaparral and other scrubland. It is particularly associated with pinyon pines, junipers, and oaks. It migrates to the south late in the fall, returning north in mid-spring. While migrating, it forages in any woodland or scrub it passes through. In its wintering grounds, it occurs in dry woodland and tall scrub. Though its status is not well known, it does not appear to be seriously threatened by habitat destruction or other human activities, unlike many migratory warblers. It is a fairly common bird, among the most common in some localities. Because it is common and not in rapid decline, it is assessed as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List.


Their breeding habitats are open pine woods in eastern North America. These birds are permanent residents in southern Florida. Some of them, however, migrate to northeastern Mexico and islands in Bermuda and the Caribbean. The first record for South America was a vagrant wintering female seen at Vista Nieve, Colombia, on 20 November 2002; this bird was foraging as part of a mixed-species feeding flock that also included wintering Blackburnian and Tennessee warblers.


The blackpoll warbler (Setophaga striata) is a New World warbler. Breeding males are mostly black and white. They have a prominent black cap, white cheeks and white wing bars. The blackpoll breeds in forests of northern North America, from Alaska throughout most of Canada, to the mountains of New York and New England. They are a common migrant through much of North America. In fall, they fly south to the Greater Antilles and the northeastern coasts of South America in a non-stop long-distance migration over open water, averaging 2500 km, one of the longest distance non-stop overwater flights ever recorded for a migratory songbird. Rare vagrants to western Europe, they are one of the more frequent transatlantic passerine wanderers.


Sherardia is a monotypic genus of flowering plants in the family Rubiaceae. The genus contains only one species, viz. Sherardia arvensis or (blue) field madder, which is widespread across most of Europe and northern Africa as well as southwest and central Asia (from Turkey to Saudi Arabia to Kazakhstan) and Macaronesia (Canary Islands, Azores, Madeira, Savage Islands). It is also reportedly naturalized in Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Kerguelen, Ethiopia, Sudan, southern Africa, Mexico, Costa Rica, South America, Bermuda, Cuba, Haiti and much of Canada and the United States (especially the Pacific States and the lower Mississippi Valley).


The mountain bluebird is the state bird of Idaho and Nevada. More generally, the bluebird has lived in writers’ and poets’ imaginations as age-old bearers of joy and reverie. The Twitter bird is based on the mountain bluebird.


The western bluebird has been displaced from its natural habitat by the felling of trees; however it has adapted to coniferous forests, farmlands, semi-open terrain, and desert to survive. The year-round range includes California, the southern Rocky Mountains, Arizona, and New Mexico in the United States, and as far south as the states of Oaxaca and Veracruz in Mexico. The summer breeding range extends as far north as the Pacific Northwest, British Columbia, and Montana. Northern birds can migrate to the southern parts of the range; southern birds are often permanent residents.


Sibbaldiopsis tridentata prefers dry and acidic soil, usually on rocky or gravelly shores that have access to a lot of sun. It is often found on shale outcrops. The species is located all over the central to eastern American states, with disjunct populations extending down the Appalachian Mountains. The species also lives in the Canadian provinces east of and including Alberta, as well as Greenland. In Nova Scotia, the species is very common in the center of the Annapolis Valley and around cliffs or rocky outcrops. The southernmost known populations are located in Georgia and North Carolina, and occupy high-elevation rock outcrops and grassy balds.
Sibbaldiopsis tridentata is listed as endangered in 5 US states.


The saffron finch  (Sicalis flaveola) is a tanager from South America that is common in open and semi-open areas in lowlands outside the Amazon Basin. They have a wide distribution in Colombia, northern Venezuela (where it is called "canario de tejado" or "roof canary"), western Ecuador, western Peru, eastern and southern Brazil (where it is called "canário-da-terra" or "native canary"), Bolivia, Paraguay, Uruguay, northern Argentina, and Trinidad and Tobago. It has also been introduced to Hawaii,Panama, Puerto Rico and elsewhere. Although commonly regarded as a canary, it is not related to the Atlantic canary. Formerly, it was placed in the Emberizidae but it is close to the seedeaters.


Moss campion is a low, ground-hugging plant. It may seem densely matted and moss-like. The dense cushions are up to a foot or more in diameter. The plants are usually about 2" tall but may be as high as 6". The bright green leaves are narrow, arising from the base of the plant. The dead leaves from the previous season persist for years, and pink flowers are borne singly on short stalks that may be up to 1" long, but are usually much shorter.  It usually has pink flowers, though very rarely they may be white. The flowers are solitary and star-shaped. They are between 6 and 12 mm wide, with hermaphrodite flowers being larger than the female ones. Female flowers produce better quality seeds than hermaphrodites and male flowers produce better quality pollen than hermaphrodites. The cushions can change the gender of their flowers between years. Gender frequencies change with altitude, the frequency of female flowers increasing with higher elevation. They usually appear in June through August. The flowers are held by a calyx which is rather firm and thick. The flowers are female, male or hermaphrodites.
The sepals are joined together into a tube that conceals the bases of the petals, which are entire. The 10 stamens and 3 styles extend well beyond the throat of the flower.
This genus, circumpolar in its distribution, is closely related to carnations. The stems and leaves are very sticky and viscid, which may discourage ants and beetles from climbing on the plant. The variety exscapa has shorter flowering stems. The other variety subacaulescens, from Wyoming and Colorado, has pale pink flowers all summer.


Common all over the high arctic and the higher mountains of Eurasia and North America, (south to the  Alps, Carpathians, southern Siberia, Pyrenees, British Isles, Iceland, Faroe Islands, Rocky Mountains, ). In the United States it inhabits Colorado, the Big Horn Mountains of Wyoming, the Wallowa Mountains of Oregon, the Olympics, the northern Cascades of Washington and Alaska.
Range:
USA (AK, AZ, CO, ID, ME, MT, NH, NM, NV, OR, UT, WA, WY)
CAN (AB, BC, LB, NF, NS, NT, NU, ON, QC, SK, YT)
DEN (GL), FRA (SPM)


Plants in Colorado have been estimated to reach  75 to 100 years in age, and Alaskan plants may reach 300 years. The oldest known Moss campion is 350 years old and has a diameter of two feet. The plant used to be used for children with colic. The raw root skin plants were consumed as a vegetable in Iceland and in Arctic regions.


Silene flos-cuculi (syn. Lychnis flos-cuculi), commonly called ragged-robin, is a perennial herbaceous plant in the family Caryophyllaceae. This species is native to Europe and Asia, where it is found along roads and in wet meadows and pastures. In Britain it has declined in numbers because of modern farming techniques and draining of wet-lands and is no longer common. However, it has become naturalized in parts of the northern United States and eastern Canada.


This plant has been in long-term decline, especially in the more northern parts of Europe, and is no longer present in many inland sites in Britain and Ireland, with a population reduction of 80% in the last ten years reported in 2006. This may be due to changes in agriculture practices, or it may perhaps be affected by climate change. It is listed as a UK Priority Species, and the Great Britain Red Data List ranks it as endangered.


Silene laciniata is a perennial herb in the family (Caryophyllaceae), commonly known as fringed Indian pink, cardinal catchfly, Mexican campion, Mexican-pink, and campion.
It is native to the southwestern United States from California to Texas, as well as northern Mexico.


Fire pink grows in open woods and rocky deciduous slopes in eastern North America, ranging as far north as extreme southern Ontario. It is protected as a state endangered species in Wisconsin and Florida, and as a state threatened species in Michigan.
Fire pink's principal pollinator is the ruby-throated hummingbird (Archilochus colubris), which is attracted by the flowers bright red petals and sugary nectar.


Milk thistle is an adaptive crop with low requirements. It's mainly cultivated as a medicinal plant but it's also mentioned as a food source. It's mainly cultivated in Europe but also in Asia and North America.  Milk thistle is a biennial plant, it is normally grown as a annual plant, which simplifies cultivation. This can be achieved when the main requirements are met, then the milk thistle already blossoms in the first year.
Milk thistle has low soil requirements and is drought resistant. The optimal pH ranges from 5.5 to 7.6, but a wide range is acceptable. The seeds are directly sown into the soil with a sowing depth of 1 to 1.5 cm. For germination, a minimal temperature of 2 °C is needed. Sowing can be done in Autumn or in Spring, depending on the climate conditions. Row spacing is between 40 and 75 cm with a plant space of about 25 cm in the rows. Fertilization is not necessarily needed because of the low nutrient requirements. A standard fertilization rate of 50 kg nitrogen, 30 kg phosphorus and 60 kg potassium per hectare is applied before sowing, to improve yields. Harvest normally occurs in July or August. Since the flower heads don't ripen evenly, optimal harvest time is about a fortnight after 50% of the flower heads are dry. For harvesting a common cereal combine harvester can be used. In Poland, average yields are 1230 kg per ha with an average silmarin content of 26.5 kg per ha.


The plant is a native shrub of the Sonoran Desert, Colorado Desert, Baja California Desert, and California chaparral and woodlands habitats in the Peninsular Ranges and San Jacinto Mountains. It is found in southern California, Arizona, and Utah (U.S.), and Baja California state (Mexico).
Jojoba is endemic to North America, and occupies an area of approximately 260,000 square kilometers (100,000 sq mi) between latitudes 25° and 31° North and between longitudes 109° and 117° West.


Each plant is dioecious, with hermaphrodites being extremely rare. The fruit is an acorn-shaped ovoid, three-angled capsule 1–2 centimeters (0.39–0.79 in) long, partly enclosed at the base by the sepals. The mature seed is a hard oval that is dark brown and contains an oil (liquid wax) content of approximately 54%. An average-sized bush produces 1 kilogram (2.2 lb) of pollen, to which few humans are allergic.
The female plants produce seed from flowers pollinated by the male plants. Jojoba leaves have an aerodynamic shape, creating a spiral effect, which brings wind-borne pollen from the male flower to the female flower. In the Northern Hemisphere, pollination occurs during February and March. In the Southern Hemisphere, pollination occurs during August and September.
Somatic cells of jojoba are tetraploid; the number of chromosomes is 2n = 4x = 52.


Sisyrinchium bellum, the western blue-eyed grass or Californian blue-eyed grass, is the common blue-eyed grass of California and Oregon in and west of the Sierra Nevada, its range extending south into Baja California. In parts of its range, western blue-eyed grass has previously been classified as Sisyrinchium eastwoodiae, S. greenei and S. hesperium, but these names are now considered synonyms.
Sisyrinchium bellum grows as a perennial plant in open places where there is some moisture, particularly grassy areas, though it can also be found in woodlands and at altitudes up to 2,400 metres (7,900 ft). Like other species of blue-eyed grasses that are locally dominant, it is generally known simply as "blue-eyed grass" within its natural range.


The breeding habitat of the white-breasted nuthatch is woodland across North America, from southern Canada to northern Florida and southern Mexico. In the eastern part of its range, its preferred habitat is old-growth open deciduous or mixed forest, including orchards, parks, suburban gardens and cemeteries; it is found mainly in the lowlands, although it breeds at 1,675 m (5,495 ft) altitude in Tennessee. In the west and Mexico, the white-breasted nuthatch is found in open montane pine-oak woodlands, and nesting occurs at up to 3,200 m (10,500 ft) altitude in Nevada, California and Mexico. Pinyon-juniper and riverside woodlands may be used locally where available. The white-breasted nuthatch is the only North American nuthatch usually found in deciduous trees; red-breasted, pygmy and brown-headed nuthatches prefer pines.
The presence of mature or decaying trees with holes suitable for nesting is essential, and trees such as oak, beech and hickory are favored in the east since they also provide edible seeds. White-breasted nuthatches seldom excavate their own nest holes like red-breasted nuthatches. Although suitable habitat is distributed continentally, it is discontinuous. The separate populations of this non-migratory species have diverged to form distinct regional subspecies.
The white-breasted nuthatch, like most of its genus, is non-migratory, and the adults normally stay in their territory year-round. There may be more noticeable dispersal due to seed failure or high reproductive success in some years, and this species has occurred as a vagrant to Vancouver Island, Santa Cruz Island, and Bermuda. One bird landed on the RMS Queen Mary six hours' sailing east of New York City in October 1963.


Like other nuthatches, the white-breasted nuthatch is a noisy bird with a range of vocalizations. The male's mating song is a rapid nasal qui-qui-qui-qui-qui-qui-qui. The contact call between members of a pair, given most frequently in the fall and winter is a thin squeaky nit, uttered up to 30 times a minute. A more distinctive sound is a shrill kri repeated rapidly with mounting anxiety or excitement kri-kri-kri-kri-kri-kri-kri-kri; the Rocky Mountains and Great Basin subspecies have a higher, faster yididitititit call, and Pacific birds a more nasal beeerf.


Predators of adult nuthatches include owls and diurnal birds of prey (such as sharp-shinned and Cooper's hawks), and nestlings and eggs are eaten by woodpeckers, small squirrels, and climbing snakes such as the western rat snake. The white-breasted nuthatch responds to predators near the nest by flicking its wings while making hn-hn calls. When a bird leaves the nest hole, it wipes around the entrance with a piece of fur or vegetation; this makes it more difficult for a predator to find the nest using its sense of smell. The nuthatch may also smear blister beetles around the entrance to its nest, and it has been suggested that the unpleasant smell from the crushed insects deters squirrels, its chief competitor for natural tree cavities. The estimated average lifespan of the white-breasted nuthatch is two years, but the record is twelve years and nine months.
The white-breasted nuthatch's responses to predators may be linked to a reproductive strategy. A study compared the white-breasted nuthatch with the red-breasted nuthatch in terms of the willingness of males to feed incubating females on the nest when presented with models of predators. The models were of a sharp-shinned hawk, which hunts adult nuthatches, and a house wren, which destroys eggs. The white-breasted nuthatch is shorter-lived than the red-breasted nuthatch, but has more young, and was found to respond more strongly to the egg predator, whereas the red-breasted showed greater concern with the hawk. This supports the theory that longer-lived species benefit from adult survival and future breeding opportunities, while birds with shorter life spans place more value on the survival of their larger broods.
The white-breasted nuthatch can be a host for certain parasites such as the protists Leucocytozoon or Trypanosoma. The white-breasted nuthatch is the typical host of another protist species, Haemoproteus sittae. Trematodes, such as Collyriclum faba, have also been recorded in this species. The white-breasted nuthatch can also be the target of hematophagous flies of the family Hippoboscidae, such as Ornithoica confluenta and Ornithomya anchineuria or of certain mites, such as Knemidokoptes jamaicensis, which produces scabies.


The white-breasted nuthatch is a common species with a large range, estimated at 8,600,000 km² (3,300,000 sq mi). Its total population is estimated at 10 million individuals, and there is evidence of an overall population increase, so it is not believed to approach either the size criterion (fewer than 10,000 mature individuals) or the population decline criterion (declining more than 30% in ten years or three generations) of the IUCN Red List. For these reasons, the species is evaluated as least concern by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.
The removal of dead trees from forests may cause problems locally for this species because it requires cavity sites for nesting; declines have been noted in Washington state, Florida, and more widely in the southeastern U.S. west to Texas. In contrast, the breeding range is expanding in Alberta, and numbers are increasing in the northeast due to regrown forest. The white-breasted nuthatch is protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918, to which the three countries in which it occurs (Canada, Mexico, and the United States) are all signatories.


The Eurasian nuthatch's breeding range extends across temperate Eurasia from Great Britain (but not Ireland) to Japan. It is found between the 16–20 °C (61–68 °F) July isotherms, north to about latitude 64°N in western Russia and 69°N in Siberia. It breeds south to the Mediterranean in Europe, although it is absent from the islands, other than Sicily, and in most of Russia the southern boundary is around 54–55°N. In the east, the range includes most of China and Taiwan and much of Korea. It has occurred as a vagrant in Lebanon and the Channel Islands, and the nominate race has been recorded a few times in Finland where S. e. asiatica is the normal form.
Most populations are sedentary, apart from some post-breeding dispersal of young birds, and there is a reluctance to cross even short stretches of open water. Northern and eastern breeders are dependent on the cones of the Siberian stone pine, and if the crop fails many birds of the S. e. asiatica subspecies may move west into northern Sweden and Finland in autumn, sometimes staying to breed. Siberian S. e. arctica may make more limited movements south and east in winter, and S. e. amurensis, from southeast Russia, is regular in winter in Korea.
The preferred habitat is mature woodland with large, old trees, which provide extensive growth for foraging and nesting holes. In Europe, deciduous or mixed forest is favoured, particularly when containing oak. Parks, old orchards and other wooded habitats may be occupied as long as they have at least a 1 ha (2.5 acres) block of suitable trees. Particularly in mountains, old spruce and pine forests are used, and pine is also favoured in Taiwan. In most of Russia, conifers are used for nesting, but population densities are relatively low. Moroccan birds nest in oak, Atlas cedar and fir. Unusual habitats include dwarf juniper in Mongolia and rocky terrain in a limited part of southern Siberia.
The Eurasian nuthatch is primarily a lowland bird in the north of its range, but reaches the tree-line in Switzerland, at 1,200 m (3,900 ft) or higher, and breeds occasionally at 1,800–2,100 m (5,900–6,900 ft) in Austria. It breeds at similar levels in the mountains of Turkey, the Middle East and Central Asia. It is mainly a mountain bird in southern Japan, 760–2,100 m (2,490–6,890 ft), and Taiwan, 800–3,300 m (2,600–10,800 ft), but in southern China, the chestnut-vented nuthatch is the highland species, with the Eurasian species at lower levels.


Across most of its European range, the most important predator of the Eurasian nuthatch is the sparrowhawk. Other species known to prey on this nuthatch include the northern goshawk, hobby, tawny owl, pygmy owl and least weasel. A Swedish study showed that 6.2% of the nuthatch nests in their study area were raided by predators. The perpetrators were not identified, but the main single predator of tit nests in the same study was the great spotted woodpecker.
Common starlings will take over Eurasian nuthatch nest holes, reducing their breeding success. This is most likely to occur if the nest is high in a tree and there is a good local breeding density of the nuthatch. Introduced ring-necked parakeets may also compete with Eurasian nuthatches for nesting holes. The parakeets tend to occur in fragmented urban woodlands, while nuthatches prefer large old oak woodlands, which reduces the level of competition. Ornithologists conducting a 2010 Belgian study suggested that the problem was not so severe as to warrant culling of the parakeets.
Mites of the genus Ptilonyssus, such as P. sittae, have been found in the Eurasian nuthatch's nasal cavities. Intestinal worms include the nematodes Tridentocapillaria parusi and Pterothominx longifilla. Small studies in Slovakia and Spain found no blood parasites, but a larger Spanish survey found some evidence of Plasmodium infection.


The European population of the Eurasian nuthatch has been estimated as 22.5–57 million birds, suggesting a global total of 45.9–228 million individuals. China, Taiwan, Korea, Japan and Russia each have between 10,000 and 100,000 breeding pairs. The known breeding area is about 23.3 million km² (9 million sq mi), which is a large proportion of the potential suitable habitat, and the population appears to be stable. The large numbers and huge breeding range mean that this species is classified by the International Union for Conservation of Nature as being of least concern.
The Eurasian nuthatch is common throughout much of its range, although densities are lower in the far north and in coniferous forests. Annual numbers in Siberia fluctuate depending on the availability of pine cones from year to year. In recent decades, the nuthatch has colonised Scotland and the Netherlands, and expanded its range in Wales, northern England, Norway and the High Atlas mountain range in North Africa. S. e. asiatica breeds intermittently in Finland and northern Sweden following irruptions. Because large trees are essential, felling or fragmentation of old woodland can lead to local declines or losses.


Sium suave grows in wetland habitats (sandy and non-sandy). These wetland habits include wet prairies, bottoms of seeps, low areas along springs, soggy thickets, swamps, borders and shallow water of ponds, marshes, and ditches. It is native to both North America and Asia in Canada, the United States, Japan, Russian Federation, South Korea, and China.


It is widespread in  Central Africa (Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Ethiopia), Mediterranean Europe (Cyprus, Albania, Croatia, Greece, Italy, Malta, Montenegro, France, Portugal, Spain), temperate Asia ( Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Turkey) and tropical Asia  (India, Bhutan, Nepal). It is also naturalized in other regions.


Smilax auriculata  is a North American plant species native to the Bahamas, the Turks & Caicos Islands, and the southeastern United States. Common names include  earleaf greenbrier and wild-bamboo, despite the fact that it is not closely related to bamboo. It is reported from Florida, Georgia, North and South Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana. It grows on coastal sand dunes and in sun-lit locations in sandy woodlands at elevations of less than 100 m (333 feet).
Smilax auriculata is a perennial vine-producing underground rhizomes and sometimes tubers. Plants are climbers with zigzag branching, sometimes reaching a height of 9 m (30 feet). Prickles on the stem are flattened and rigid, about 4 mm (0.16 inches) long. Leaves are evergreen, narrowly ovate, not waxy, up to 8.5 cm (3.4 inches) long. Flowers are green, borne in umbels of 3–8 flowers. Berries are dark purple, almost black, about 6 mm (0.24 inches) in diameter.


Smilax herbacea, the smooth carrionflower or smooth herbaceous greenbrier, is a plant in the catbriar family.  It is native to eastern Canada (Quebec, Ontario, New Brunswick) and the eastern United States (as far south as Georgia and Alabama). Its preferred natural habitat is rich forests, and riparian thicket and meadows.


Smilax rotundifolia is found in the eastern half of the continental United States including Texas, South Dakota, and Oklahoma with the exception of Vermont. It ranges from Florida north into Northern Ontario.  Smilax rotundifolia is native to the USA.
Common greenbrier grows along roadsides, landscapes, clearings and woods. In clearings it often forms dense and impassable thickets.  It can be found in almost all habitat types including wetlands.


Solanum carolinense, the Carolina horsenettle, is not a true nettle, but a member of the Solanaceae, or nightshade family. It is a perennial herbaceous plant, native to the southeastern United States, though its range has expanded throughout much of temperate North America. The plant is an invasive in parts of Europe, Asia, and Australia. The stem and undersides of larger leaf veins are covered with prickles.
"Horsenettle" is also written "horse nettle" or "horse-nettle", though USDA publications usually use the one-word form. Though there are other horsenettle nightshades, S. carolinense is the species most commonly called "the horsenettle". Other common names include radical weed, sand brier or briar, bull nettle, tread-softly, Solanum mammosum ("apple of Sodom"), devil's tomato and wild tomato.


Tomatoes were not grown in England until the 1590s. One of the earliest cultivators was John Gerard, a barber-surgeon. Gerard's Herbal, published in 1597, and largely plagiarized from continental sources, is also one of the earliest discussions of the tomato in England. Gerard knew the tomato was eaten in Spain and Italy. Nonetheless, he believed it was poisonous (in fact, the plant and raw fruit do have low levels of tomatine, but are not generally dangerous; see below). Gerard's views were influential, and the tomato was considered unfit for eating (though not necessarily poisonous) for many years in Britain and its North American colonies.
However, by the mid-18th century, tomatoes were widely eaten in Britain, and before the end of that century, the Encyclopædia Britannica stated the tomato was "in daily use" in soups, broths, and as a garnish. They were not part of the average person's diet, and though by 1820 they were described as "to be seen in great abundance in all our vegetable markets" and to be "used by all our best cooks", reference was made to their cultivation in gardens still "for the singularity of their appearance", while their use in cooking was associated with exotic Italian or Jewish cuisine.


The tomato was introduced to cultivation in the Middle East by John Barker, British consul in Aleppo circa 1799 to 1825. Nineteenth century descriptions of its consumption are uniformly as an ingredient in a cooked dish. In 1881, it is described as only eaten in the region "within the last forty years". Today, the tomato is a critical and ubiquitous part of Middle Eastern cuisine, served fresh in salads (e.g., Arab salad, Israeli salad, Shirazi salad and Turkish salad), grilled with kebabs and other dishes, made into sauces, and so on.


The earliest reference to tomatoes being grown in British North America is from 1710, when herbalist William Salmon reported seeing them in what is today South Carolina. They may have been introduced from the Caribbean. By the mid-18th century, they were cultivated on some Carolina plantations, and probably in other parts of the Southeast as well. Possibly, some people continued to think tomatoes were poisonous at this time; and in general, they were grown more as ornamental plants than as food. Thomas Jefferson, who ate tomatoes in Paris, sent some seeds back to America. Some early American advocates of the culinary use of the tomato included Michele Felice Cornè and Robert Gibbon Johnson.
Early tomato breeders included Henry Tilden in Iowa and a Dr. Hand in Baltimore.
Alexander W. Livingston receives much credit for developing numerous varieties of tomato for both home and commercial gardeners. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's 1937 yearbook declared that "half of the major varieties were a result of the abilities of the Livingstons to evaluate and perpetuate superior material in the tomato." Livingston's first breed of tomato, the Paragon, was introduced in 1870, the beginning of a great tomato culture enterprise in the county. In 1875, he introduced the Acme, which was said to be involved in the parentage of most of the tomatoes introduced by him and his competitors for the next twenty-five years.
When Livingston began his attempts to develop the tomato as a commercial crop, his aim had been to grow tomatoes smooth in contour, uniform in size, and sweet in flavor. He eventually developed over seventeen different varieties of the tomato plant. Today, the crop is grown in every state in the Union.
Because of the long growing season needed for this heat-loving crop, several states in the US Sun Belt became major tomato-producers, particularly Florida and California. In California, tomatoes are grown under irrigation for both the fresh fruit market and for canning and processing. The University of California, Davis (UC Davis) became a major center for research on the tomato. The C.M. Rick Tomato Genetics Resource Center at UC Davis is a gene bank of wild relatives, monogenic mutants and miscellaneous genetic stocks of tomato. The center is named for the late Dr. Charles M. Rick, a pioneer in tomato genetics research. Research on processing tomatoes is also conducted by the California Tomato Research Institute in Escalon, California.
In California, growers have used a method of cultivation called dry-farming, especially with Early Girl tomatoes. This technique encourages the plant to send roots deep to find existing moisture in soil that retains moisture, such as clayey soil.


In 2020, world production of tomatoes was 187 million tonnes, with China accounting for 35% of the total, followed by India, Turkey, and the United States as major producers (table).


Solanum pseudocapsicum is a nightshade species with mildly poisonous fruit. It is commonly known as the Jerusalem cherry, Madeira winter cherry, or, ambiguously, "winter cherry". These perennials can be grown decoratively as house plants, but in some areas of South Africa, India, Australia and New Zealand it is regarded as a weed.


The English word potato comes from Spanish patata (the name used in Spain). The Royal Spanish Academy says the Spanish word is a hybrid of the Taíno batata ('sweet potato') and the Quechua papa ('potato'). The name originally referred to the sweet potato although the two plants are not closely related. The 16th-century English herbalist John Gerard referred to sweet potatoes as common potatoes, and used the terms bastard potatoes and Virginia potatoes for the species we now call potato. In many of the chronicles detailing agriculture and plants, no distinction is made between the two. Potatoes are occasionally referred to as Irish potatoes or white potatoes in the United States, to distinguish them from sweet potatoes.
The name spud for a potato comes from the digging of soil (or a hole) prior to the planting of potatoes. The word has an unknown origin and was originally (c. 1440) used as a term for a short knife or dagger, probably related to the Latin spad- a word root meaning "sword"; compare Spanish espada, English "spade", and spadroon. It subsequently transferred over to a variety of digging tools. Around 1845, the name transferred to the tuber itself, the first record of this usage being in New Zealand English. The origin of the word spud has erroneously been attributed to an 18th-century activist group dedicated to keeping the potato out of Britain, calling itself the Society for the Prevention of Unwholesome Diet. It was Mario Pei's 1949 The Story of Language that can be blamed for the word's false origin. Pei wrote "the potato, for its part, was in disrepute some centuries ago. Some Englishmen who did not fancy potatoes formed a Society for the Prevention of Unwholesome Diet. The initials of the main words in this title gave rise to spud." Like many. other pre-20th century acronymic origins, this is false, and there is no evidence that a Society for the Prevention of Unwholesome Diet ever existed.
At least seven languages—Afrikaans, Dutch, French, (West) Frisian, Hebrew, Persian and some variants of German—are known to use a term for "potato" that translates roughly (or literally) into English as "earth apple" or "ground apple".


There are about 5,000 potato varieties worldwide. Three thousand of them are found in the Andes alone, mainly in Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, Chile, and Colombia. They belong to eight or nine species, depending on the taxonomic school. Apart from the 5,000 cultivated varieties, there are about 200 wild species and subspecies, many of which can be cross-bred with cultivated varieties. Cross-breeding has been done repeatedly to transfer resistances to certain pests and diseases from the gene pool of wild species to the gene pool of cultivated potato species.
The major species grown worldwide is Solanum tuberosum (a tetraploid with 48 chromosomes), and modern varieties of this species are the most widely cultivated. There are also four diploid species (with 24 chromosomes): S. stenotomum, S. phureja, S. goniocalyx, and S. ajanhuiri. There are two triploid species (with 36 chromosomes): S. chaucha and S. juzepczukii. There is one pentaploid cultivated species (with 60 chromosomes): S. curtilobum. There are two major subspecies of Solanum tuberosum: andigena, or Andean; and tuberosum, or Chilean. The Andean potato is adapted to the short-day conditions prevalent in the mountainous equatorial and tropical regions where it originated; the Chilean potato, however, native to the Chiloé Archipelago, is adapted to the long-day conditions prevalent in the higher latitude region of southern Chile.
The International Potato Center, based in Lima, Peru, holds 4,870 types of potato germplasm, most of which are traditional landrace cultivars. The international Potato Genome Sequencing Consortium announced in 2009 that they had achieved a draft sequence of the potato genome, containing 12 chromosomes and 860 million base pairs, making it a medium-sized plant genome. More than 99 percent of all current varieties of potatoes currently grown are direct descendants of a subspecies that once grew in the lowlands of south-central Chile. Nonetheless, genetic testing of the wide variety of cultivars and wild species affirms that all potato subspecies derive from a single origin in the area of present-day southern Peru and extreme Northwestern Bolivia (from a species in the Solanum brevicaule complex).
Most modern potatoes grown in North America arrived through European settlement and not independently from the South American sources, although at least one wild potato species, Solanum fendleri, naturally ranges from Peru into Texas, where it is used in breeding for resistance to a nematode species that attacks cultivated potatoes. A secondary center of genetic variability of the potato is Mexico, where important wild species that have been used extensively in modern breeding are found, such as the hexaploid Solanum demissum, as a source of resistance to the devastating late blight disease. Another relative native to this region, Solanum bulbocastanum, has been used to genetically engineer the potato to resist potato blight.


Genetic research has produced several genetically modified varieties. 'New Leaf', owned by Monsanto Company, incorporates genes from Bacillus thuringiensis, which confers resistance to the Colorado potato beetle; 'New Leaf Plus' and 'New Leaf Y', approved by US regulatory agencies during the 1990s, also include resistance to viruses. McDonald's, Burger King, Frito-Lay, and Procter & Gamble announced they would not use genetically modified potatoes, and Monsanto published its intent to discontinue the line in March 2001.
Waxy potato varieties produce two main kinds of potato starch, amylose and amylopectin, the latter of which is most industrially useful. BASF developed the Amflora potato, which was modified to express antisense RNA to inactivate the gene for granule bound starch synthase, an enzyme which catalyzes the formation of amylose. Amflora potatoes therefore produce starch consisting almost entirely of amylopectin, and are thus more useful for the starch industry. In 2010, the European Commission cleared the way for 'Amflora' to be grown in the European Union for industrial purposes only—not for food. Nevertheless, under EU rules, individual countries have the right to decide whether they will allow this potato to be grown on their territory. Commercial planting of 'Amflora' was expected in the Czech Republic and Germany in the spring of 2010, and Sweden and the Netherlands in subsequent years. Another GM potato variety developed by BASF is 'Fortuna' which was made resistant to late blight by adding two resistance genes, blb1 and blb2, which originate from the Mexican wild potato Solanum bulbocastanum. In October 2011 BASF requested cultivation and marketing approval as a feed and food from the EFSA. In 2012, GMO development in Europe was stopped by BASF. In November 2014, the USDA approved a genetically modified potato developed by J.R. Simplot Company, which contains genetic modifications that prevent bruising and produce less acrylamide when fried than conventional potatoes; the modifications do not cause new proteins to be made, but rather prevent proteins from being made via RNA interference.
Genetically modified varieties have met public resistance in the United States and in the European Union.


In 2020, world production of potatoes was 359 million tonnes, led by China with 22% of the total (table). Other major producers were India, Russia, Ukraine and the United States. It remains an essential crop in Europe (especially northern and eastern Europe), where per capita production is still the highest in the world, but the most rapid expansion over the past few decades has occurred in southern and eastern Asia.


Peruvian cuisine naturally contains the potato as a primary ingredient in many dishes, as around 3,000 varieties of this tuber are grown there.
Some of the more notable dishes include boiled potato as a base for several dishes or with ají-based sauces like in Papa a la Huancaína or ocopa, diced potato for its use in soups like in cau cau, or in Carapulca with dried potato (papa seca). Smashed condimented potato is used in causa Limeña and papa rellena. French-fried potatoes are a typical ingredient in Peruvian stir-fries, including the classic dish lomo saltado.
Chuño is a freeze-dried potato product traditionally made by Quechua and Aymara communities of Peru and Bolivia, and is known in various countries of South America, including Peru, Bolivia, Argentina, and Chile. In Chile's Chiloé Archipelago, potatoes are the main ingredient of many dishes, including milcaos, chapaleles, curanto and chochoca. In Ecuador, the potato, as well as being a staple with most dishes, is featured in the hearty locro de papas, a thick soup of potato, squash, and cheese.


In the UK, potatoes form part of the traditional staple, fish and chips. Roast potatoes are commonly served as part of a Sunday roast dinner and mashed potatoes form a major component of several other traditional dishes, such as shepherd's pie, bubble and squeak, and bangers and mash. New potatoes may be cooked with mint and are often served with butter.
The Tattie scone is a popular Scottish dish containing potatoes. Colcannon is a traditional Irish food made with mashed potato, shredded kale or cabbage, and onion; champ is a similar dish. Boxty pancakes are eaten throughout Ireland, although associated especially with the North, and in Irish diaspora communities; they are traditionally made with grated potatoes, soaked to loosen the starch and mixed with flour, buttermilk and baking powder. A variant eaten and sold in Lancashire, especially Liverpool, is made with cooked and mashed potatoes.
In the UK, game chips are a traditional accompaniment to roast gamebirds such as pheasant, grouse, partridge and quail.
Powdered cooked potato has been sold in the UK since the 1960s as Smash and is used as a food for camping  and domestically.
Halushky are the national dish of many Slavic nations. Halušky dumplings are made from a batter consisting of flour and grated potatoes. Bryndzové halušky are associated to Slovak cuisine in particular.
In Germany, Northern (Finland, Latvia and especially Scandinavian countries), Eastern Europe (Russia, Belarus and Ukraine) and Poland, newly harvested, early ripening varieties are considered a special delicacy. Boiled whole and served un-peeled with dill, these "new potatoes" are traditionally consumed with Baltic herring. Puddings made from grated potatoes (kugel, kugelis, and potato babka) are popular items of Ashkenazi, Lithuanian, and Belarusian cuisine. German fried potatoes and various versions of Potato salad are part of German cuisine. Bauernfrühstück (literally farmer's breakfast) is a warm German dish made from fried potatoes, eggs, ham and vegetables.
Cepelinai is the national dish of Lithuania. They are a type of dumpling made from grated raw potatoes boiled in water and usually stuffed with minced meat, although sometimes dry cottage cheese (curd) or mushrooms are used instead.
In Western Europe, especially in Belgium, sliced potatoes are fried to create frieten, the original French fried potatoes. Stamppot, a traditional Dutch meal, is based on mashed potatoes mixed with vegetables.
In France, the most notable potato dish is the Hachis Parmentier, named after Antoine-Augustin Parmentier, a French pharmacist, nutritionist, and agronomist who, in the late 18th century, was instrumental in the acceptance of the potato as an edible crop in the country. Pâté aux pommes de terre is a regional potato dish from the central Allier and Limousin regions. Gratin dauphinois, consisting of baked thinly sliced potatoes with cream or milk, and tartiflette, with Reblochon cheese, are also widespread.
In the north of Italy, in particular, in the Friuli region of the northeast, potatoes serve to make a type of pasta called gnocchi. Similarly, cooked and mashed potatoes or potato flour can be used in the Knödel or dumpling eaten with or added to meat dishes all over central and Eastern Europe, but especially in Bavaria and Luxembourg. Potatoes form one of the main ingredients in many soups such as the vichyssoise and Albanian potato and cabbage soup. In western Norway, komle is popular.
Potato pancakes are popular all over Central Europe, and are also known in Scandinavia, and in Jewish cuisine.
A traditional Canary Islands dish is Canarian wrinkly potatoes or papas arrugadas. Tortilla de patatas (potato omelette) and patatas bravas (a dish of fried potatoes in a spicy tomato sauce) are near-universal constituent of Spanish tapas.


In the US, potatoes have become one of the most widely consumed crops and thus have a variety of preparation methods and condiments. French fries and often hash browns are commonly found in typical American fast-food burger "joints" and cafeterias. One popular favourite involves a baked potato with cheddar cheese (or sour cream and chives) on top, and in New England "smashed potatoes" (a chunkier variation on mashed potatoes, retaining the peel) have a great popularity. Potato flakes are popular as an instant variety of mashed potatoes, which reconstitute into mashed potatoes by adding water, with butter or oil and salt to taste. A regional dish of Central New York, salt potatoes are bite-size new potatoes boiled in water saturated with salt then served with melted butter. At more formal dinners, a common practice includes taking small red potatoes, slicing them, and roasting them in an iron skillet. Among American Jews, the practice of eating latkes (fried potato pancakes) is common during the festival of Hanukkah.
A traditional Acadian dish from New Brunswick is known as poutine râpée. The Acadian poutine is a ball of grated and mashed potato, salted, sometimes filled with pork in the centre, and boiled. The result is a moist ball about the size of a baseball. It is commonly eaten with salt and pepper or brown sugar. It is believed to have originated from the German Klöße, prepared by early German settlers who lived among the Acadians. Poutine, by contrast, is a hearty serving of French fries, fresh cheese curds and hot gravy. Tracing its origins to Quebec in the 1950s, it has become a widespread and popular dish throughout Canada.
Potato grading for Idaho potatoes is performed in which No. 1 potatoes are the highest quality and No. 2 are rated as lower in quality due to their appearance (e.g. blemishes or bruises, pointy ends). Potato density assessment can be performed by floating them in brines. High-density potatoes are desirable in the production of dehydrated mashed potatoes, potato crisps and french fries.


In East Asia, particularly Southeast Asia, rice is by far the predominant starch crop, with potatoes a secondary crop, especially in China and Japan. However, it is used in northern China where rice is not easily grown, with a popular dish being 青椒土豆丝 (qīng jiāo tǔ dòu sī), made with green pepper, vinegar and thin slices of potato. In the winter, roadside sellers in northern China will also sell roasted potatoes. It is also occasionally seen in Korean and Thai cuisines.


See text: acrylamides, esp introduction; acrylamide was accidentally discovered in foods in April 2002 by scientists in Sweden when they found the chemical in starchy foods, such as potato chips, French fries, and bread that had been heated (production of acrylamide in the heating process was shown to be temperature-dependent)


Solanum xanti, known commonly as chaparral nightshade, purple nightshade, and San Diego nightshade, is a member of the genus Solanum. It is native to the Western United States in Arizona, California, Nevada, and Oregon, and to northwest Mexico in Baja California.
The plant grows in chaparral, oak woodlands, conifer forests, desert Madrean Sky Islands, and other habitats.


Red imported fire ants are among the worst invasive species in the world. Some scientists consider the red imported fire ant to be a "disturbance specialist"; human disturbance to the environment may be a major factor behind the ants' impact (fire ants tend to favour disturbed areas). This is shown through one experiment, demonstrating that mowing and plowing in studied areas diminished the diversity and abundance of native ant species, whereas red imported fire ants found on undisturbed forest plots had only diminished a couple of species.
In the United States, the red imported fire ant first arrived in the seaport of Mobile, Alabama, by cargo ship between 1933 and 1945. Arriving with an estimated 9 to 20 unrelated queens, the red imported fire ant was only rare at the time, as entomologists were unable to collect any specimens (with the earliest observations first made in 1942, preceded by a population expansion in 1937); the population of these ants exploded by the 1950s. Since its introduction to the United States, the red imported fire ant has spread throughout the southern states and northeastern Mexico, negatively affecting wildlife and causing economic damage. The expansion of red imported fire ants may be limited since they are almost wiped out during Tennessee winters, thus they may be reaching their northernmost range. However, global warming may allow the red imported fire ant to expand its geographical range. As of 2004, the ant is found in 13 states and occupies over 128 million hectares of land, and as many as 400 mounds can be found on a single acre of land. The United States Department of Agriculture estimates that they expand 120 miles (193 km) westward per year. Likely due to absence of South American competitors - and lower numbers of native competitors - S. invicta dominates more extrafloral nectaries and hemipteran honeydew sources in the southern USA than in its home range.
Red imported fire ants were first discovered in Queensland, Australia, in 2001. The ants were believed to be present in shipping containers arriving at the Port of Brisbane, most likely from North America. Anecdotal evidence suggests fire ants may have been present in Australia for six to eight years prior to formal identification. The potential damage from the red imported fire ant prompted the Australian government to respond rapidly. A joint state and federal funding of A$175 million was granted for a six-year eradication programme. Following years of eradication, eradication rates of greater than 99% from previously infested properties were reported. The program received extended Commonwealth funding of around A$10 million for at least another two years to treat the residual infestations found most recently. In December 2014, a nest was identified at Port Botany, Sydney, in New South Wales. The port was quarantined, and a removal operation took place. In September 2015, populations originating from the United States were found at a Brisbane airport.
Red imported fire ants have spread beyond North America. The Invasive Species Specialist Group (ISSG) reports the ant inhabiting from three of the Cayman Islands. However, the sources the ISSG cited give no report about them on the island, but recent collections indicate that they are present. In 2001, red imported fire ants were discovered in New Zealand, but they were successfully eradicated several years later. Red imported fire ants have been reported in India, Malaysia, the Philippines and Singapore. However, these reports were found to be incorrect as the ants collected there were incorrectly identified as the red imported fire ant. In Singapore, the ants were most likely misidentified as well. In India, surveyed ants in Sattur Taluk, India listed the red imported fire ant there in high populations; meanwhile, no reports of the ant were made outside the surveyed area. In 2016, scientists state that despite no presence of the ant in India, the red imported fire ant will more than likely find suitable habitats within India's ecosystem if given the opportunity. The reports in the Philippines most likely misidentified collected material as the red imported fire ant, as no populations have been found there. It was discovered in Hong Kong and mainland China in 2004, where they have spread into several provinces as well as Macau and Taiwan. No geographic or climatic barriers prevent these ants from spreading further, thus it may spread throughout the tropical and subtropical regions of Asia. In Europe, a single nest was found in the Netherlands in 2002.
Around 1980, red imported fire ants began spreading throughout the West Indies, where they were first reported in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Between 1991 and 2001, the ant was recorded from Trinidad and Tobago, several areas in the Bahamas, the British Virgin Islands, Antigua, and the Turks and Caicos Islands. Since then, red imported fire ants have been recorded on more islands and regions, with new populations discovered in: Anguilla, Saint Martin, Barbuda, Montserrat, Saint Kitts, Nevis, Aruba, and Jamaica. The ants recorded from Aruba and Jamaica have only been found on golf courses; these courses import sod from Florida, so such importation may be an important way for the ant to spread throughout the West Indies.
Populations found outside North America originate from the United States. In 2011, the DNA of specimens from Australia, China, and Taiwan was analysed with results showing that they are related to those in the United States. Despite its spread, S. geminata has a greater geographical range than the red imported fire ant, but it can be easily displaced by it. Because of this, almost all of its exotic range in North America has been lost and the ant has almost disappeared there. On roadsides in Florida, 83% of these sites had S. geminata present when the red imported fire ant was absent, but only 7% when it is present. This means that the ant can probably invade many tropical and subtropical regions where S. geminata populations are present.


Solidago altissima has diploid, tetraploid, and hexaploid populations and morphological variations which has generally led to classifying it into two subspecies, which roughly speaking can be identified as being from the eastern and western parts of the continent. At least in the Midwest, it is common to have plants of different ploidy interspersed, with little apparent tendency for one type to dominate even a fairly local geographical area.
Within Solidago, S. altissima is part of the Solidago canadensis species complex, which is classified in the subsection Triplinervae. S. altissima has sometimes been classified as part of S. canadensis.
Subspecies
Solidago altissima subsp. altissima: This is the autonym subspecies. It is in eastern Canada except Newfoundland and Labrador, and it is in the provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba. In the United States, it is east of the Mississippi River except Wisconsin, Illinois, and North Carolina; all U.S. states directly on the west of the Mississippi River; and, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Utah, Arizona, and California. In Mexico, it is in the north except on the Baja California Peninsula, Sonora, and Sinaloa. It is in all other states as far south as Oaxaca and Veracruz except Mexico, Morelos, Puebla, Tlaxcala, and Mexico City. It is native in all of the above states and provinces where it resides. It is an introduced species in East China, South Central China, Korea, New South Wales, Taiwan, and Transcaucasus.
Solidago altissima subsp. gilvocanescens (Rydb.) Semple: This subspecies is in western Canada and Ontario. In the United States, it is only east of the Mississippi River in Illinois, and is then distributed west through the Great Plains states. In Mexico, it overlaps subsp. altissima except in the west.


The common eider (pronounced /ˈaɪ.dər/) (Somateria mollissima), also called St. Cuthbert's duck or Cuddy's duck, is a large (50–71 cm or 20–28 in in body length) sea-duck that is distributed over the northern coasts of Europe, North America and eastern Siberia. It breeds in Arctic and some northern temperate regions, but winters somewhat farther south in temperate zones, when it can form large flocks on coastal waters. It can fly at speeds up to 113 km/h (70 mph).
The eider's nest is built close to the sea and is lined with eiderdown, plucked from the female's breast. This soft and warm lining has long been harvested for filling pillows and quilts, but in more recent years has been largely replaced by down from domestic farm-geese and synthetic alternatives. Although eiderdown pillows or quilts are now a rarity, eiderdown harvesting continues and is sustainable, as it can be done after the ducklings leave the nest with no harm to the birds.


The common eider is both the largest of the four eider species and the largest duck found in Europe, and is exceeded in North America only by smatterings of the Muscovy duck, which only reaches North America in a wild state in southernmost Texas (and arguably south Florida where feral but non-native populations reside). It measures 50 to 71 cm (19+1⁄2 to 28 in) in length, weighs 0.81 to 3.04 kg (1 lb 12+1⁄2 oz to 6 lb 11 oz) and spans 80–110 cm (31–43 in) across the wings. The average weight of 22 males in the North Atlantic was 2.21 kg (4 lb 14 oz) while 32 females weighed an average of 1.92 kg (4 lb 3+1⁄2 oz). It is characterized by its bulky shape and large, wedge-shaped bill. The male is unmistakable, with its black and white plumage and green nape. The female is a brown bird, but can still be readily distinguished from all ducks, except other eider species, on the basis of size and head shape. The drake's display call is a strange almost human-like "ah-ooo," while the hen utters hoarse quacks. The species is often readily approachable.
Drakes of the European, eastern North American and Asia/western North American races can be distinguished by minor differences in plumage and bill colour. Some authorities place the subspecies v-nigra as a separate species.
This species dives for crustaceans and molluscs, with mussels being a favoured food. The eider will eat mussels by swallowing them whole; the shells are then crushed in their gizzard and excreted. When eating a crab, the eider will remove all of its claws and legs, and then eat the body in a similar fashion.
It is abundant, with populations of about 1.5–2 million birds in both North America and Europe, and also large but unknown numbers in eastern Siberia (HBW).
A particularly famous colony of eiders lives on the Farne Islands in Northumberland, England. These birds were the subject of one of the first ever bird protection laws, established by Saint Cuthbert in the year 676. About 1,000 pairs still nest there every year. Because St. Cuthbert is the patron saint of Northumberland, it was natural that the eider should be chosen as the county's emblem bird; the birds are still often called Cuddy's ducks in the area, "Cuddy" being the familiar form of "Cuthbert".
In Canada's Hudson Bay, important eider die-offs were observed in the 1990s by local populations due to quickly changing ice flow patterns. The Canadian Wildlife Service has spent several years gathering up-to-date information on their populations, and preliminary results seem to show a population recovery. The common eider is the object of the 2011 documentary People of a Feather, which studies the historical relationship between the Sanikiluaq community and eiders, as well as various aspects of their ecology.
The common eider is one of the species to which the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds (AEWA) applies.


S. semiannulata is native to the Southwestern United States, in Arizona, Nevada, California, Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas, and Utah, as well as northern Mexico, in Chihuahua, Coahuila, Durango, Nuevo León, and Sonora.


Johnson grass or Johnsongrass, Sorghum halepense,  is a plant in the grass family, Poaceae, native to Asia and northern Africa. The plant has been introduced to all continents except Antarctica, and most larger islands and archipelagos. It reproduces by rhizomes and seeds.
Johnson grass has been used for forage and to stop erosion, but it is often considered a weed because:
Foliage that becomes wilted from frost or hot, dry weather can contain sufficient amounts of hydrogen cyanide to kill cattle and horses if it is eaten in quantity.
The foliage can cause 'bloat' in such herbivores from the accumulation of excessive nitrates; otherwise, it is edible.
It grows and spreads rapidly, it can 'choke out' other cash crops planted by farmers.
This species occurs in crop fields, pastures, abandoned fields, rights-of-way, forest edges, and along streambanks. It thrives in open, disturbed, rich, bottom ground, particularly in cultivated fields.
Johnson grass that is resistant to the common herbicide glyphosate has been found in Argentina and the United States. It is considered to be one of the ten worst weeds in the world.  In the United States, Johnson grass is listed as either a noxious or quarantined weed in 19 states. With Sorghum bicolor it is a parent of Sorghum × almum, a forage crop also considered a weed in places.
It is named after an Alabama plantation owner, Colonel William Johnson, who sowed its seeds on river-bottom farm land circa 1840. The plant was already established in several US states a decade earlier, having been introduced as a prospective forage or accidentally as a seedlot contaminant.
In early 20th century Talladega County, there were mixed feelings about Johnson grass. It was considered a nutritious, palatable and productive forage, but many farmers still found it undesirable. Fields of this grass fell into a "sod bound" state of insufficient new growth unless they were plowed every two or three seasons.
A genetic study employing microsatellite markers has investigated Johnsongrass populations across 12 states and confirmed that the weed was introduced to US from Alabama and North Carolina. Moreover, the study also detected an unreported independent introduction from Arizona. After trans-continental railroad building the two founding populations began to intermix at around Texas shifting diversity from centers of introduction.
The 1889 book The Useful Native Plants of Australia records that Sorghum halepense is a "strong, erect-growing species, varying from two to ten feet high, succulent when young, a splendid grass for a cattle run, though not much sought after by sheep. It is a free seeder. The settlers on the banks of the Hawkesbury (New South Wales) look upon it as a recent importation, and seed of it has been distributed under the name of Panicum speciabile. (WooUs) Coast of Queensland, New South Wales, and Western Australia."


Sparganothoides lentiginosana, the lentiginos moth, is a species of moth of the family Tortricidae. It is found in the United States from Maryland to Florida, west to Arkansas, Texas and Oklahoma, ranging south to Mexico in Tamaulipas and Veracruz. It is found in a wide range of habitats, ranging from urban areas to mixed pine-deciduous woodlands at low elevations.
The length of the forewings is 6–6.5 mm for males and 6.3–7.4 mm for females. The ground color of the forewings is yellowish brown to golden yellow (or sometimes brownish orange) with orange or brown scaling. The hindwings are variable, ranging from pale yellowish white to yellowish grey or grey. Adults have been recorded year round, except November and December. There are several generations per year.
The larvae have been reared on Malus sylvestris and Achillea millefolium. First instar larvae web the edges of the leaves of their host plant.


This species occurs throughout the Caribbean Sea, and the western Atlantic Ocean in the waters of Bermuda, Florida, the Bahamas to Central America and Brazil.


The stoplight parrotfish (Sparisoma viride) is a species of marine ray-finned fish, a parrotfish from the family Scaridae, inhabiting coral reefs in Florida, Caribbean Sea, Gulf of Mexico, Bermuda and as far south as Brazil. It mainly feeds on algae by scraping and excavating it with its teeth. Like most of its relatives, it is able to change sex.
The common name, stoplight, comes from the marked yellow spot near the pectoral fin, which is clearly visible only in specimens in the terminal phase.


The northern shoveler (/ˈʃʌvələr/; Spatula clypeata), known simply in Britain as the shoveler, is a common and widespread duck. It breeds in northern areas of Europe and across the Palearctic and across most of North America, wintering in southern Europe, the Indian subcontinent, Southeast Asia, Central, the Caribbean, and northern South America. It is a rare vagrant to Australia. In North America, it breeds along the southern edge of Hudson Bay and west of this body of water, and as far south as the Great Lakes west to Colorado, Nevada, and Oregon.
The northern shoveler is one of the species to which the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds (AEWA) applies. The conservation status of this bird is Least Concern.


This is a bird of open wetlands, such as wet grassland or marshes with some emergent vegetation. It breeds in wide areas across Eurasia, western North America and the Great Lakes region of the United States.
This bird winters in southern Europe, the Indian Subcontinent, the Caribbean, northern South America, Malay Archipelago, Japan and other areas. Those wintering in the Indian Subcontinent make the taxing journey over the Himalayas, often taking a break in wetlands just south of the Himalaya before continuing further south to warmer regions. In North America it winters south of a line from Washington to Idaho and from New Mexico east to Kentucky, also along the Eastern Seaboard as far north as Massachusetts. In the British Isles, home to more than 20% of the North Western European population, it is best known as a winter visitor, although it is more frequently seen in southern and eastern England, especially around the Ouse Washes, the Humber and the North Kent Marshes, and in much smaller numbers in Scotland and western parts of England. In winter, breeding birds move south, and are replaced by an influx of continental birds from further north. It breeds across most of Ireland, but the population there is very difficult to assess. Surveys in 2017 and 2018 suggest that it is more common and widespread  in Ireland
than previously thought.
It is strongly migratory and winters further south than its breeding range. It has occasionally been reported as a vagrant as far south as Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. It is not as gregarious as some dabbling ducks outside the breeding season and tends to form only small flocks. Among North America's duck species, northern shovelers trail only mallards and blue-winged teal in overall abundance. Their populations have been healthy since the 1960s, and have soared in recent years to more than 5 million birds (2015), most likely because of favorable breeding, migration, and wintering habitat conditions.


They are known to interbreed with blue-winged teals, which are very close relatives.
Subspecies are:
Spatula cyanoptera septentrionalium (Oberholser, 1906) northern cinnamon teal breeds from British Columbia to northwestern New Mexico, and they winter in northwestern South America.
Spatula cyanoptera tropica (Snyder & Lumsden, 1951) tropical cinnamon teal occurs in the Cauca Valley and Magdalena Valley in Colombia.
Spatula cyanoptera borreroi (Snyder & Lumsden, 1951) Borrero's cinnamon teal (possibly extinct) occurs in the eastern Andes of Colombia with records of apparently resident birds from northern Ecuador. It is named for Colombian ornithologist José Ignacio Borrero.
Spatula cyanoptera orinoma (Snyder & Lumsden, 1951) Andean cinnamon teal occurs in the Altiplano of Peru, northern Chile and Bolivia.
Spatula cyanoptera cyanoptera (Vieillot, 1816) Argentine cinnamon teal occurs in southern Peru, southern Brazil, Argentina, Chile, and the Falkland Islands.


These birds feed by dabbling in shallow water at the edge of marshes or open water. They mainly eat plants; their diet may include molluscs and aquatic insects.
Blue-winged teal are generally the first ducks south in the fall and the last ones north in the spring. Adult drakes depart the breeding grounds well before adult hens and immatures. Most blue-winged teal flocks seen after mid-September are composed largely of adult hens and immatures. The northern regions experience a steady decline in blue-winged teal populations from early September until early November. Blue-winged teal in central migration areas tend to remain through September, then diminish rapidly during October, with small numbers remaining until December. Large numbers of blue-winged teal appear on wintering grounds in Florida, Louisiana, and Texas in September.


The adult male is unmistakable, with its brown head and breast with a broad white crescent over the eye. The rest of the plumage is grey, with loose grey scapular feathers It has a grey bill and legs. In flight, it shows a pale blue speculum with a white border. When swimming it will show prominent white edges on its tertials. His crown (anatomy) is dark and his face is reddish brown.
Some care is needed in separating the brown female from the similar common teal, but the stronger face markings and more frequent head-shaking when dabbling are good indicators. Confusion with the female of the blue-winged teal is also possible, but the head and bill shape is different, and the latter species has yellow legs. Pale eyebrow, dark eye line, pale lore spot bordered by a second dark line.
Measurements:
Size: 41 cm
Wingspan: 58 - 69 cm.
Weight: 300- 440 g
These birds feed mainly by skimming rather than upending.
The male has a distinctive crackling mating call; the female is rather silent for a female duck, but can manage a feeble quack.
Garganey are rare breeding birds in the British Isles, with most breeding in quiet marshes in Norfolk and Suffolk. In Ireland a few pairs breed in County Wexford, and at Lough Beg in County  Londonderry, with occasional breeding elsewhere.
The garganey is one of the species to which the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds (AEWA) applies. The status of the garganey on the IUCN Red List is least concern.


The bronze mannikin was formally described in 1837 by the English naturalist William John Swainson and given the binomial name Spermestes cucullata. The specific epithet is from Late Latin cucullatus meaning "hooded". The type locality is Senegal.
Two subspecies are recognised:
S. c. cucullata Swainson, 1837 – Senegal and Gambia to south Sudan, Uganda, west Kenya and the island of Bioko
S. c. scutata Heuglin, 1863 – Ethiopia and east Kenya to southeast South Africa, east Angola and Comoro Islands


The bronze mannikin' is native to mainland Africa and the Bioko, Pemba, Zanzibar, Mafia and Comoro islands, and has been introduced to Puerto Rico, where it is established. The two accepted races have an extensive region around the upper Nile River which is inhabited by birds with intermediate features. A proposed third race, S. c. subsp. tressellata Clancey, 1964 is not generally recognized.


The dark green fritillary (Speyeria aglaja) is a species of butterfly in the family Nymphalidae. The insect has a wide range in the Palearctic realm - Europe, Morocco, Iran, Siberia, Central Asia, China, Korea, and Japan.


The regal fritillary (Speyeria idalia) is a striking nymphalid butterfly found among some of the remaining tallgrass and mixed-grass prairies in the east-central United States. This prairie-specialist butterfly has a characteristic deep orange color and unmistakable dark hindwings with two bands of spots (Brock 2003). On the female, both bands of spots are white. However, on the male, the outer band of spots is orange in color. Females also tend to be slightly larger than males. The ventral surface of the hindwings is olive brown to black in color with bold silvery white spots (Selby 2007). The wingspan of S. idalia usually measures 68–105 millimetres (2.7–4.1 in) (Selby 2007). Flight is in the summertime from approximately June to September and adults tend to be swift in flight, coasting close to the ground (Brock 2003). It is listed as a species of special concern and believed extirpated in the US state of Connecticut.
Regal fritillary larvae are approximately 0.08 inches long after they hatch and reach a length of approximately 1.75 inches when fully developed (Edwards 1879). The mature larvae have a black body with yellowish-orange bands and stripes. There are yellowish middorsal and lateral stripes and a number of dorsal, subdorsal, and lateral fleshy spines extending from the body. The head of the mature larvae is rounded and small, orangish-red on top and black underneath (Edwards 1879).
The larval food source for the regal fritillary and all members of the genus Speyeria are violets (Viola spp.) (Selby 2007). The violets are an extremely important component of habitat sustainability for the regal fritillary and there is a correlation between the number of violets present and the number of butterflies found in a given area (Kelly and Debinski 1998). Violet species that the larvae feed on include Viola pedata (bird's-foot violet), V. pedatifida (blue prairie violet), V. papilionacea (common blue violet), V. lanceolata (lance-leafed violet), V. nuttallii (Nuttall's violet) (Kelly and Debinski 1998), V. sagittata (arrowleaf violet), and V. tricolor (Johnny Jumpup) (Selby 2007). These various violet species are associated with the different areas of the regal fritillary's range. For example, the bird's-foot violet and the prairie violet tend to be the preferred larval food source for the regal in the Midwest and Great Plains regions (Selby 2007).
The adult butterflies may feed on a variety of nectar plants and their availability throughout the summer flight time can be as important as the presence of larval food plants in determining whether an area can support populations of butterfly species (Selby 2007). Milkweeds, thistles, coneflowers, blazing-stars, bergamots, clovers, goldenrods, and ironweeds are some of the most important nectar sources for adult regal fritillaries. Milkweeds and thistles have been observed to be the preferred nectar source throughout the regal fritillary's range (Selby 2007). These two types of plants provide a constant supply of nectar due to their staggered growth times. Common milkweed starts blooming when male regal fritillaries begin to emerge early in the summer and thistles tend to bloom later in the season which is crucial to females approaching oviposition (Selby 2007).