WHERE’S WILDLIFE · FIELD SKILLS
Compare flower shapes, clusters, leaves, and fruits with named plant examples. Tap any illustration pair to enlarge it. Illustrations are not to scale.
Start with one flower. Look from the front and side: a front view alone can hide a tube, bell, or spur.
Three white petals alternate with three narrower green sepals.
White Trillium
Trillium grandiflorum
Four broad yellow petals surround a cross-shaped stigma.
Common Evening Primrose
Oenothera biennis
Five pink petals form the open flower.
Wild Geranium
Geranium maculatum
Six yellow tepals: three petals and three similar-looking sepals.
Yellow Trout Lily
Erythronium americanum
Several lines through the center can divide the flower into matching halves.
Carolina Rose
Rosa carolina
One plane divides the flower into matching left and right halves. Many pea-family and mint-family flowers have this symmetry.
Common Blue Violet
Viola sororia
A joined corolla widens into a bell. Bells may face down, out, or up; direction is a separate clue.
Harebell
Campanula rotundifolia
The joined petals form a relatively narrow tube. Examine the opening for lobes and symmetry.
Trumpet Honeysuckle
Lonicera sempervirens
A narrow base broadens toward the opening, like a trumpet.
Hedge Bindweed
Calystegia sepium
Upper and lower lips form a distinct landing platform or mouth. Look from the side as well as the front.
White Turtlehead
Chelone glabra
A backward-projecting pouch or tube extends from part of the flower. A side view reveals it.
Wild Columbine
Aquilegia canadensis
What looks like one flower is a head of many small florets. Outer rays may resemble petals; some heads have only disk or only ray florets.
Oxeye Sunflower
Heliopsis helianthoides
Field note: Petal counts are clues, not rules. Sepals can look like petals; similar-looking petals and sepals are called tepals. Count lobes as well as separate petals, and check several flowers.
Follow the flower stalks to their attachment points. The branching pattern is more useful than the outline alone.
One flower terminates a stalk or branch.
Bloodroot
Sanguinaria canadensis
Flowers attach directly to an unbranched axis, without individual flower stalks.
Blue Vervain
Verbena hastata
One spike is shown; a complete plant usually carries several spikes.
Each flower has its own short stalk along one unbranched main axis.
Wild Lupine
Lupinus perennis
The main axis branches, and its branches carry stalked flowers or spikelets.
Switchgrass
Panicum virgatum
Flower stalks radiate from a single point, like umbrella spokes.
Common Milkweed
Asclepias syriaca
The main rays end in smaller umbels, called umbellets.
Golden Alexanders
Zizia aurea
Stalks arise at different heights. Longer lower stalks bring flowers to roughly the same level.
Common Yarrow
Achillea millefolium
Flower heads form a compound, corymb-like flat-topped cluster.
The main axis ends in a flower. Two lateral branches arise below it and also end in flowers; this branching pattern may repeat.
Fire Pink
Silene virginica
The central terminal flower opens first; younger flowers develop on the two side branches.
A one-sided, curved cyme straightens as successive flowers open. This is a different form of cyme from the two-branched example.
True Forget-me-not
Myosotis scorpioides
Older flowers and spent calyces lie below the younger buds near the curved end.
Flowers appear in rings around the stem. In many mints, paired clusters form a false whorl.
Motherwort
Leonurus cardiaca
Field note: A flat-topped cluster is not automatically an umbel. Some clusters contain smaller flower heads rather than individual flowers. These are simplified structural diagrams.
Look at several stem joints (nodes), not just a single leaf. Arrangement describes where whole leaves occur on the plant.
One leaf per node; leaves may alternate sides or spiral around the stem.
Canada Goldenrod
Solidago canadensis
Two leaves arise at the same node, across from one another.
Common Milkweed
Asclepias syriaca
Three or more leaves arise at the same node.
Culver’s Root
Veronicastrum virginicum
Leaves cluster close to the ground, often with a flowering stalk rising above them.
Common Dandelion
Taraxacum officinale
Leaves spread from a ground-level crown; flower stalks are leafless.
Field note: The same plant can have different lower and upper leaves. A basal rosette describes a cluster near ground level, not a separate kind of leaf blade.
Attachment describes how a blade joins the stem. A plant can be both opposite in arrangement and stalkless in attachment.
A distinct leaf stalk (petiole) connects the blade to the stem.
Wild Geranium
Geranium maculatum
The blade attaches directly to the stem; there is no distinct petiole.
Butterfly Milkweed
Asclepias tuberosa
The blade base partly wraps around the stem.
New England Aster
Symphyotrichum novae-angliae
The blade surrounds the stem so the stem appears to pass through it.
Large-flowered Bellwort
Uvularia grandiflora
The bases of two opposite leaves join around the stem. Boneset is a familiar example.
Common Boneset
Eupatorium perfoliatum
The leaf base wraps around a length of stem, as in grasses.
Switchgrass
Panicum virgatum
Field note: Photograph the actual junction. A leaf that merely overlaps the stem in a photo is not necessarily clasping or perfoliate.
A leaf is not the same as a leaflet. Find where the entire leaf attaches to the main stem.
One continuous blade, even if its edge is deeply lobed.
Common Milkweed
Asclepias syriaca
Cuts enter the blade, but do not divide it into separate leaflets.
White Oak
Quercus alba
A compound leaf divided into three distinct leaflets.
Wild Strawberry
Fragaria virginiana
Leaflets attach along a central axis, the rachis.
American Elderberry
Sambucus canadensis
Separate leaflets radiate from one point at the end of the petiole.
Ohio Buckeye
Aesculus glabra
The primary divisions are themselves divided into leaflets.
Kentucky Coffeetree
Gymnocladus dioicus
Field note: A bud belongs at the base of a whole leaf, not at the base of each leaflet. Buds may be tiny or hidden. A lobed leaf can still be simple.
Use the shape of an entire blade or leaflet, then inspect its margin and veins.
Long and narrow, with nearly parallel sides.
Little Bluestem
Schizachyrium scoparium
Much longer than wide; widest below the middle and tapering toward the tip.
New England Aster
Symphyotrichum novae-angliae
Widest below the middle, toward the blade base.
American Basswood
Tilia americana
An oval blade widest near the middle.
Common Milkweed
Asclepias syriaca
An upside-down egg shape: widest above the middle.
Common Bearberry
Arctostaphylos uva-ursi
A heart-like blade with a notch at the base.
Common Blue Violet
Viola sororia
A smooth margin without teeth or lobes.
Common Milkweed
Asclepias syriaca
Saw-like teeth point toward the blade tip.
American Elm
Ulmus americana
Rounded, scalloped teeth along the margin.
Ground Ivy
Glechoma hederacea
Side veins branch from one main midrib.
American Beech
Fagus grandifolia
Several major veins spread from one point near the blade base.
Sugar Maple
Acer saccharum
Major veins run side by side along the blade.
Canada Lily
Lilium canadense
Field note: These traits combine: a leaf can be lance-shaped, toothed, and pinnately veined at the same time. Shapes grade into one another; compare several mature leaves.
A fruit develops from a flower’s ovary, sometimes with other flower parts. It may be fleshy or dry. Seeds are contained in or associated with the fruit.
A fleshy fruit without a single hard stone. May contain one or many seeds; shown cut open.
Pokeweed
Phytolacca americana
The dark fruits are fleshy berries; their appearance does not establish edibility.
A fleshy fruit surrounding a hard stone that encloses the seed; shown cut open.
Chokecherry
Prunus virginiana
A dry fruit that opens to release seeds, often through splits, pores, or a lid.
Northern Blue Flag
Iris versicolor
A dry fruit that opens along one seam. A milkweed pod is an example.
Common Milkweed
Asclepias syriaca
A dry pea-family fruit, typically opening along two seams.
Wild Blue Indigo
Baptisia australis
A small, dry, one-seeded fruit that stays closed; the fruit wall is not fused to the seed coat.
Tall Buttercup
Ranunculus acris
Each small unit is an achene; several develop together in a fruiting head.
A dry, closed fruit with a papery wing that helps it travel on air currents.
Sugar Maple
Acer saccharum
Fine hairs can carry fruits or seeds on the wind. A dandelion’s pappus travels with its dry fruit; milkweed silk travels with a seed.
Common Milkweed
Asclepias syriaca
Many small fruits develop from separate ovaries in one flower. A raspberry consists of small drupes.
Red Raspberry
Rubus idaeus
Field note: Fruit structure and dispersal features are different clues. A wing or plume is not a separate universal fruit type. Do not use these illustrations to decide whether a plant is edible.
Trace a flowering stalk to its own leaves before taking close-ups. Mixed vegetation can put another species’ leaves beside your seed head.
Bend the blade gently away from the stem. Photograph the thin flap on the inside, just above the sheath.
Orchardgrass
Dactylis glomerata
A ligule may be a fringe of hairs, or a short membrane with a hairy edge. Photograph the junction closely enough to distinguish these forms.
Big Bluestem
Andropogon gerardii
A short ligule membrane has a fringe of hairs along its edge.
A node is a stem joint; an internode is the length between joints. Include both, but do not confuse the joint with the ligule.
Switchgrass
Panicum virgatum
A spikelet contains one or more florets, usually above a pair of glumes. Some have a bristle called an awn; others do not.
Wild Oat
Avena fatua
The glumes surround the florets; a bent awn extends from a floret.
Field note: Grass identification often needs spikelet measurements and a hand lens. A seed head’s outline, stem color, or wet habitat alone may not settle the species.
These simplified views introduce the parts that botanical descriptions refer to. Real flowers vary in number, fusion, position, and presence of these structures.
A side cutaway shows petals above the usually green sepals, with the stalk below.
Wild Geranium
Geranium maculatum
An underside view separates the green sepals from the pink petals.
An anther produces pollen and is usually supported by a slender filament.
Canada Lily
Lilium canadense
The stigma receives pollen. A style connects it to the ovary, which contains ovules; ovules can become seeds.
Canada Lily
Lilium canadense
Field note: Sepals protect the bud; petals often attract pollinators. A bract is a modified leaf associated with a flower or cluster—it is not automatically a petal.
One clear flower portrait is a good start. These views make an identification much more useful:
Keep the plant in place, avoid trampling surrounding vegetation, and do not collect specimens without permission. Several features together are more dependable than flower color or habitat alone.
Use these terms to describe what you see, then compare the complete plant with species accounts. This page introduces common forms; it is not a complete identification key.
Original schematic drawings and AI-assisted botanical illustrations created for Where’s Wildlife. Plant examples highlight the named feature; they are illustrations, not identification photographs. Forms are simplified and scales differ.
Terminology references: Oregon State University: Examining Leaves; NC State Extension: Botany; Washington State University: Basic Botany; USA National Phenology Network: Botany Primer.