BISC_Plant_Transect

Witcher, Brian; Witcher, Brian; Witcher, Brian

A systematic, quantitative inventory of the flora of Biscayne National Park was conducted between October 2001 and September 2004. The park flora is now known to consist of 454 taxa. In addition to the 454, forty-two more are reported as historically occurring in the park but are believed to be extirpated there, representing a total historical flora of 496 taxa. We report 151 plant taxa previously unreported for the park, including 134 that we discovered during our field surveys. One species that was discovered in the park, Opuntia corallicola, was thought to be on the brink of extinction in the wild with only about a dozen plants. Many new populations of other locally rare plant taxa were also found. Of the 454 plants now known to occur in the park 322 (70.1%) are native, 108 (23.8%) are naturalized exotics, and 24 (5.3%) are known from the park only from cultivation.