Narrative

Pitcher plant (Sarracenia purpurea) is found in bogs from Labrador west to the Canadian Rocky Mountains and south to Florida, Kentucky, and Iowa. The hollow leaves are usually filled with water containing drowned insects. The scapes are from one to two feet tall and bear a single nodding flower. Although this flower can rarely be somewhat yellow, it is usually a dark reddish color. In northern Illinois, this plant bloomed in late May.

The red color will help identify this lifeform. This lifeform is found in bogs. This lifeform is widespread, but not common.

This lifeform is found east of the Continental Divide in North America.

Sarracenia genus is native to North America and can be found as far north as Canada and as far south as Florida. The leaves form pitchers or trumpet shapes with a terminal lid. There are eight species with seven subspecies and numerous hybrids.

Pitcher Plants (Family Sarraceniaceae) are limited to North America and northern South America. There are only fourteen species in this family in three different genera. The leaves of these plants (which radiate from the main stem at the base) form pitchers which entrap insects which are digested into the plant. Most are bog species. There are nine species in two genera established in greater North America.

Insect Eating Plants (Order Sarraceniales) are usually broken into three different families.

Dicots (Dicotyledoneae Class) are the predominant group of vascular plants on earth. With the exception of the grasses (Monocots) and the Conifers (Gymnosperms), most of the larger plants that one encounters are Dicots. Dicots are characterized by having a seed with two outer shell coverings.

Some of the more primitive Dicots are the typical hardwood trees (oaks, birches, hickories, etc). The more advanced Dicots include many of the Composite (Aster) Family flowers like the Dandelion, Aster, Thistles, and Sunflowers. Although many Monocots reach a very high degree of specialization, most botanists feel that the Dicots represent the most advanced group of plants.

Seed plants (Phylum Embryophyta) are generally grouped into one large phylum containing three major classes: the Gymnosperms, the Monocots, and the Dicots. (Some scientists separate the Gymnosperms into a separate phylum and refer to the remaining plants as flowering plants or Angiospermae.)

For North American counts of the number of species in each genus and family, the primary reference has been John T. Kartesz, author of A Synonymized Checklist of the Vascular Flora of the United States, Canada, and Greenland (1994). The geographical scope of his lists include, as part of greater North America, Hawaii, Alaska, Greenland, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands.

Kartesz lists 21,757 species of vascular plants comprising the ferns, gymnosperms and flowering plants as being found in greater North America (including Alaska, Hawaii, Greenland, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.

There are estimates within the scientific world that about half of the listed North American seed plants were originally native with the balance being comprised of Eurasian and tropical plants that have become established.