Once the family has been determined, it’s time to find the genus. 

Every family has one (

type

genus) to hundreds

•

In California’s flora, there are many genera that you can also 
learn to recognize in the field including 

Eriogonum, 

Arctostaphylos, Ceanothus

, and 

Delphinium.

•

In some families, the genera (plural of genus) are better 
defined but some overlap with each other (although very few 
genera are capable of crossing)

•

Once the genus has been found out, the species or kinds need 
to be figured out. Some genera have a single species 
(monotypic) while others have hundreds of species, in which 
case keying to species can be difficult (especially when 
microscopic characters are used as in the Boraginaceae

•

Species do often hybridize, making exact i.d. almost 
impossible in some groups like the oaks