Our goal is to produce electronic keys to aid in the identification of the flowering plant families of French Guiana, the genera within families, and the species within genera. A primary advantage of electronic publication is that changes can be made as errors are encountered or as new species or additional data about already known species are discovered. If you find mistakes or ways to make the keys more efficient, please report your suggestions for improving the family key to Nathan P. Smith and comments about the keys relating to Lecythidaceae should be directed to Scott A. Mori.The key choices are often linked to a term under question in the glossary and determinations can be verified by checking the family, generic, or species pages linked to the taxon names.

The following keys are available:

For the keys to work properly you will need to have Java Virtual Machine (JVM) 1.4.2 or greater installed. This is available free of charge from Sun Microsystems at http://www.java.com. You may also need to change your browser settings to allow popups for this website. If the features and entities do not appear to be aligned properly, click the “restart key” on the tool bar. The Lucid keys are easier to use if both the “Feature” and “Entity” thumbnails are turned off. Click their buttons “off” in the tool bar and this will make the check boxes appear in the features and entities windows, respectively. If the features or entities are illustrated with images or links to botanical terms or taxa their presence will be indicated by icons next to the check box.