Co's Digital Flora of the Philippines
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Co's Digital Flora of the Philippines
Summary
This illustrated checklist of the Philippine vascular flora is a continuation of the work of Elmer D. Merrill (1876-1956) and Leonardo L. Co (1953-2010).
Co’s Digital Flora of the Philippines is actually a checklist of vascular plants native to the Philippine archipelago. Leonard Co worked his entire life updating the checklist produced by Merrill in the 1920s. As such, it is not an actual flora where one typically finds keys and descriptions of each species. Many species entries are also accompanied by other information such as distributions within and outside of the Philippines, flowering and fruiting times, and economic uses. We have called this a Digital Flora because the checklist is supplemented with thousands of photographs of the plants. These photos often contain sufficient information for the user to make a positive identification of the plant. Thus, in lieu of actual keys and descriptions (which could be added later), we feel this is an expeditious approach to making information on the Flora available to many users.