I recommend that you always start by searching the broadest general search term first: the genera search, without specifying species.
The way this search feature is set up, these are good search terms, in the proper order.
dogwood
dogwood, flowering
cornus
cornus florida
skunk
skunk, spotted
cherry, black
These search terms will not work, due to being in an order the computer doesn’t like:
flowering dogwood
spotted skunk
common persimmon
black cherry
I recommend a simple search term– just type “dogwood.” This way the results will include all the animals that eat any of the dogwood species. Similarly for animal search, start by typing with the broad name “skunk” and it will retrieve information for both the different skunk species.
You can search by exact genus and species if you want, but I don’t recommend it because if you do a genus-only search, you will get all the species results as well. If you try something you suspect should be in the system, it probably is. If you typed “gum, sweet” and got nothing, experiment around until you find it is listed in there as “sweetgum.”
