Sources for Identification
Calscape
This native plant database is perfect for identifying and confirming the IDs of native plants. This site records all known California native plants, making it an excellent source to check a plant's known status. For each plant, there are images, descriptions, growth conditions, and habitat information. Calscape is particularly useful for verifying an identification and finding additional information on the plant..
PlantID.net
Enter a plant's characteristics on this website, and you will be presented with numerous plants with matching descriptions. You can scroll through the matches and click on plants to see additional photos and information of the plants. Though PlantID.net is great for identifying plants from sight, the results it yields from a search includes all plants in the California wild, not just native ones.
Wildflower Search
This site is great for searching all plants in your area. Just enter your location and all of the plants in your vicinity will come up, displaying names and photos. You can further narrow your search by entering specific descriptors on the sidebar. Click on a plant and various information on the plant will pop up, including information on native status, observation period, and some photos (though limited). Wildflower search is great for identifying specific plants that you only know the appearance of, not the name.
Wildflowers of the United States
This massive database of United States Wildflowers allows you to search for flowers by state. The California wildflower database, linked below, allows you to search for plant by name, scientific name, or family or scroll through a list of labelled plant photos. For each plant, more comprehensive information on the plant, including common names, family, and taxonomy, is provided.
The American Southwest
This blog is great for identifying plants, particularly wildflowers, with a larger range. You can either identify plants by name, or look at images of plants, which can be narrowed down by physical characteristics, to determine an identification. Because it is a blog, you should make sure to cross-check any identifications with other sites, like Calscape.
Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center
This wildflower database provides great information on plants, including their native ranges, descriptions, growing conditions, ecological role, and other salient information. This website is not great for identifying plants, but it is perfect for learning more about them.
Friends of Edgewood
This site, curated by the Edgewood Nature Preserve, has a range of information related to Edgewood Park, a local open space preserve near I-280. From this site, you can learn about Edgewood’s hiking trails, volunteer opportunities, and, most importantly, the park’s numerous native plants. Though you have to specifically search up a plant to learn about it, the depth of the information is astounding. This website is not ideal for identification, but it is great for learning more about a plant, such as its family, dimensions, uses, and ecological importance.
Sources for the Historical Uses of Native Plants
Plants for a Future
This database provides extensive information on the edible, medicinal, and other uses of plants, including a number of California natives. Plants for a Future assesses the edibility, medicinal uses, and general usability of a searched plant, offering ratings and additional information. Though this site is not particularly useful in determining how a plant was used by Native Americans, it does provide solid general information on a plant’s uses.
Native American Ethnobotany Database
The Native American Ethnobotany Database (NAEB) is perhaps the most useful digital resource on the uses of plants by Native American peoples. The NAEB database contains comprehensive information on how different Native American tribes derived food, drugs, dyes and fibers from native plants. Search any native plant and NAEB will list the ways said plant was used by different tribes. The site does have some flaws — namely, the website is old and some of the tribes’ names used are outdated — but overall this is an excellent resource for learning about Native American plant uses.
Resources
While I hope that this website is a great resource on Bay Area native plants in of itself, I am sure many of you will want to learn more. I have curated the list of digital resources below, including numerous reliable sources for plant identification and historical uses information, for your future research. Enjoy! Please note: when you are identifying plants, be sure to cross check any identification with other sources to verify it.