Japanese boxwood (Buxus microphylla) is native to Japan, Korea, and China. This is a compact shrub usually less than 3 feet high. The leaves are small, normally less than 1 inch in length. There are numerous hybrids for this very popular garden plant. (This plant does not appear in Kartesz!)

Boxwood genus (Buxus) contains about 70 species of usually evergreen shrubs or small trees. The genus can be found in Eurasia, widely in central and southern Africa, and widely and commonly in the northern tropics of the New World including Central America and the Caribbean. . The leathery toothless leaves are without petioles or else with very short petioles. Kartesz shows 4 species as established in his greater North America which includes Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.

Boxwood family (Buxaceae) is a tropical family found mainly in the Old World. In the New World, this family is primarily found in the Andes of South America. In the Old World this family is found in southern Europe, and SE Asia to southern China. There are local populations in southern California and NW Mexico. There are also some populations in central and southern Africa.

This family contains evergreen herbs, shrubs, and trees. This is a small family with only about 60 species spread among five different genera. There are six species placed in two genera (Buxus and Pachysandra) that are established in greater North America.

Sapindales Order is a diverse group of mostly trees and shrubs. In older taxonomic works there were about 25 different families in this order. Some modern authors retain only about 10 families. This order is very widespread in the world, and seemingly only absent from a few dry deserts.

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.

Plant kingdom contains a large variety of different organisms including mosses, ferns, and seed plants. Most plants manufacture their energy from sunlight and water. Identification of many species is difficult in that most individual plants have characteristics that have variables based on soil moisture, soil chemistry, and sunlight.

Because of the difficulty in learning and identifying different plant groups, specialists have emerged that study only a limited group of plants. These specialists revise the taxonomy and give us detailed descriptions and ranges of the various species. Their results are published in technical journals and written with highly specialized words that apply to a specific group.

On the other hand, there are the nature publishers. These people and companies undertake the challenging task of trying to provide easy to use pictures and descriptions to identify those species.

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