Polemonium occidentale
Greene · speciesAt a glance
Sources10 archives
Databases and archives Polemonium occidentale's data was compiled from.
WikipediaWikimedia Foundation2 languages↗
BioWikiNetmultilingual Wikipediamultilingual↗
GBIFGlobal Biodiversity Information Facility1 733 records↗
ENAEuropean Nucleotide Archive · EMBL-EBI9 eDNA detections↗
BOLD SystemsCentre for Biodiversity Genomics15 specimens↗
GRIN TaxonomyUSDA-ARSdistribution & uses↗
Open Tree of LifeOpenTreephylogeny backbone↗
CCDBChromosome Counts DB · Tel Aviv U.genome & karyotype↗
PloiDBPloidy Databasegenome & karyotype
GLoBIGlobal Biotic Interactionsbiotic interactions↗Every layer below draws on the sources above — open one to explore it, or use ← → to move between tabs.
Polemonium occidentale is a species of flowering plant in the phlox family known by the common names western polemonium and western Jacob's-ladder. There are two subspecies.Schmidt, L. J. Conservation Assessment for Polemonium occidentale v. lacustre, Western Jacob's Ladder. USFS. September 2003. The common ssp. occidentale is native to western North America from British Columbia to Colorado to California, where it can be found in moist areas of many habitat types, including meadows and woodlands. There is also a rare subspecies, ssp. lacustre, which is known only from a total of three counties in Minnesota and Wisconsin, and is found only in white cedar swamp habitat there. This is a rhizomatous perennial herb producing an erect stem up to one meter tall. The leaves are located along the stem, each divided into many small lance-shaped leaflets. The inflorescence is an open, elongated array of several bell-shaped, five-lobed flowers each up to 1.5 centimeters long. The flower corolla is blue to bright purple with a white throat. The rare subsp. lacustre faces threats including peat mining in its swamp habitat, herbivory by deer, and alterations in the local hydrology where it grows. There are only five populations of this subspecies.Center for Plant Conservation
No narrative description available for this taxon yet.
Size & morphology4
Life cycle & reproduction24
Diet & foraging1
Habitat & environment24
Physiology & chemistry19
Uses & economy13
Other traits6
A DNA barcode is a short, standardised stretch of genes that works like a fingerprint — enough to tell one species from another. Below is the molecular trace Polemonium occidentale has left across the world's sequence archives.
At a glance
★ the standard DNA barcode for this group — the short region actually read to tell this species apart. The rest are extra genes sequenced along the way.
The complete instruction manual Polemonium occidentale carries — its genome. We read it from three angles — how big it is, how the DNA is packed into chromosomes, and how completely it has been sequenced — and explain how to read each value as you go.
Chromosomes & ploidyhow the DNA is packaged
2n is the full chromosome count in a normal body cell; n is a gamete (egg or sperm), which carries half. Ploidy is how many complete chromosome sets each cell holds — 2× (diploid) is typical for animals, while higher levels (polyploidy) are common in plants. Click any value below to see the underlying records and sources.
2n 181×CCDB · book-ipcn67-71
diploid inferred1×PloiDB · genus-scale
How far back this lineage goes — and how we know. Everything here is measured in Ma, short for “mega-annum”: millions of years ago. The chart reads left to right like a calendar of the Earth, from the deep past on the left to today at the right edgetop to bottom like a core drilled through the Earth, from the deep past at the top down to today at the bottom.
At a glance
When this lineage existed
How to read this: the coloured strip along the bottomdown the left is the geological calendar — the standard epochs (Pliocene, Pleistocene…) every museum uses, shown so you can see which chapter of Earth's history this lineage lived in. This lineage is a young one, so the strip is zoomed in to epochs — the finer subdivisions inside a period. The orange marker is the DNA clock: DNA accumulates mutations at a roughly steady rate, so comparing this species' DNA with its relatives estimates when the lineage split off — independently of any fossil.
Record type1 733 records
Origin
Range
Wildobservation + sensor
Human sightings and records, or camera-trap / sensor detections — someone (or a device) saw or captured the species in the wild.
Museum / Voucheredphysical evidence
Backed by a physical specimen — a herbarium sheet, sample or voucher held in a collection. “Vouchered” means supported by material evidence, not just an observation.
Wildobservation + sensor
Human sightings and records, or camera-trap / sensor detections — someone (or a device) saw or captured the species in the wild.
Holding institutions48 of 66 geolocated
Institutions and collections holding physical, vouchered specimens of this species — click a row to fly to it on the map.
| Institution | Specimens |
|---|---|
| Bronx, US | 88 |
| Moscow, US | 85 |
| WTUlocation not on record | 78 |
| Corvallis, US | 66 |
| Pullman, US | 43 |
| Boise, US | 43 |
| Claremont, US | 39 |
| Missoula, US | 32 |
| Pocatello, US | 27 |
| Musee des Dinosaures d'Esperaza (Aude)location not on record | 27 |
| Victoria, CA | 22 |
| Logan, US | 21 |
| Davis, US | 20 |
| Wuzhou, CN | 20 |
| DOI/NPS, Little Rock Central High School National Historic Sitelocation not on record | 19 |
| Riverside, US | 17 |
| CASlocation not on record | 14 |
| Denver, US | 13 |
| Caldwell, US | 13 |
| Provo, US | 11 |
| Chongqing Museumlocation not on record | 8 |
| Santa Barbara, US | 7 |
| Truckee, US | 6 |
| Bozeman, US | 5 |
| Albuquerque, US | 5 |
| University of Lethbridgelocation not on record | 4 |
| Los Angeles, US | 4 |
| Arcata, US | 4 |
| San Diego, US | 4 |
| Museo civico La Terra e l'Uomo di Crocetta del Montellolocation not on record | 4 |
| Portland, US | 4 |
| Henderson, US | 4 |
| Flagstaff, US | 4 |
| Tacoma, US | 3 |
| US | 3 |
| Pittsburg, US | 3 |
| DOI/NPS, Colonial National Historical Parklocation not on record | 3 |
| Bend, US | 3 |
| Saint Louis, US | 3 |
| B.A. Bennett Herbariumlocation not on record | 2 |
| San Luis Obispo, US | 2 |
| Yellowstone National Park Herbariumlocation not on record | 2 |
| Weber State Universitylocation not on record | 2 |
| Tampa, US | 2 |
| Grand Junction, US | 2 |
| Fullerton, US | 2 |
| Whitehorse, CA | 2 |
| Canadian Department of Agriculturelocation not on record | 2 |
| DOI/NPS, Greenbelt Parklocation not on record | 2 |
| Angwin, US | 2 |
| Severin-McDaniel Insect Collectionlocation not on record | 2 |
| Ashland, US | 1 |
| Bureau of Land Management, Medford District Officelocation not on record | 1 |
| Wellington, NZ | 1 |
| University of Stellenboschlocation not on record | 1 |
| Green Bay, US | 1 |
| Columbia, US | 1 |
| Phoenix, US | 1 |
| San Angelo, US | 1 |
| Cheney, US | 1 |
| US | 1 |
| Bangkok, TH | 1 |
| Macomb, US | 1 |
| STNFlocation not on record | 1 |
| SEFlocation not on record | 1 |
| Bloomington, US | 1 |
Where the DNA of Polemonium occidentale was picked up in samples of water, soil or air — nobody saw the organism, only its DNA left behind. A trace is a clue that the species was near, not a confirmed sighting.
Signal
Where its DNA was found
How strong is each trace?
Modelled climatemodelled
How to read this: each dot is one detection of this species' DNA in an environmental sample. The confidence meter weighs how many independent studies and places back up the signal — one detection in one study is a hint; many across several studies is solid. Records dated before 2008 (when eDNA methods began) are treated as likely mislabeled and left off the map.