Narrative

Wax Flower (Pyrola uniflora to Monesus uniflora) is found across Canada to Alaska, and south to Pennsylvania, New Mexico, and California.

This lifeform is widespread in North America.

Pyrola genus (wintergreen) is native to the Northern Hemisphere. There are about 15 species in this genus. These are perennial smooth herbs with rhizomes. The leaves are usually in a basal cluster with long petioles. There are seven species and P. asarifolia has two subspecies (assuming Moneses uniflora is retained in that genus; there is only one species in North America in the Moneses genus).

Pyrola Family (Pyrolaceae) is a small family of about forty species of the Northern Hemisphere. These are mostly evergreen perennials with branched rootstocks and petioled leaves. There are 12 species spread in four genera now established in greater North America.

Ericales Order is usually divided into four 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.