This course will be offered every Fall semester.  It will be taught by Prof. Chris Dick - Fall 2022 and Prof. Ines Ibanez - Fall 2023.

Woody plants are part of ecological systems -- forests and woodlands of the Earth’s landscape. Such landscape ecosystems are volumetric, layered segments of the Earth's skin where plants and animals occur in dynamic interaction with the physical site factors (atmosphere, physiography, and soil) and with each other. In Woody Plants, we stress their ecology, natural history and identification by learning woody plants in the ecosystems and communities where they naturally occur as individuals.  In the course, woody plant identification is the basis for the study of their ecology, natural history, and biology. The identification portion is taught primarily in the field. The plants are studied in natural habitats as far as possible. The ecosystems visited include three beech-sugar maple forests, four oak-hickory forests, two river floodplain forests, a second-growth forest on an old lake plain, swamps and bogs, roadsides, and several highly disturbed sites. We also study plants not native in Michigan by visiting plantations in Stinchfield Woods. In addition to the important characteristics, in the field labs we stress important natural history features of many plants. Save