Plants are extremely complex and diverse, and there are millions of different plant species— some that haven’t even been fully discovered and studied yet! In order to continue the study and organization of plants, botanists (scientists who study plants) must find a way to categorize the many different species. While all plants are made up of similar parts that are essential in maintaining their survival (i.e. having roots, stem, leaves, etc.), they often look different. These differences in characteristics are used to group plants into species, which provides a way of classifying and therefore organizing plants.

While there are many ways to structure plant classification, one way is to group them into vascular and non-vascular plants, seed bearing and spore bearing, and angiosperms and gymnosperms. Plants can also be classified as grasses, herbaceous plants, woody shrubs, and trees.

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