Next time it happens I'll post you a link.

This search for Cat tails:

http://garden.org/plants/searc...

Next time it happens I'll post you a link.

This search for Cat tails:

http://garden.org/plants/searc...

I see...I'm putting an "s" on the end. Search for Cat Tail and it's fine.

Too bad you can't do what Google does and add a "do you mean Cat Tail?" thingy

hmm, and I searched for Cat Tails (with an s) and this is what I got: http://garden.org/plants/searc...

Cat Tails, Euphorbia leucadendron is the very first listing. Is that the plant you were searching for Lee Anne?

No..I was looking for cat Tail, I put an "s" on the end and it messed up the search. When you search Cat Tail it's the right one.

I get it to work either way, with an S and without.
What plant are you looking for? Cattail? All one word? That's why it won't work, the space between the words you are using.

I searched for Cat Tails and got the Cat Tails Euphorbia (Euphorbia leucadendron.

Typha latifolia: Cattail (Typha latifolia) (the plant Lee Anne was searching for) is one I've always heard called Cattails (all one word) in the south, but I got No results when I searched for that spelling ... another example of how common names for plants can get confusing.

When searching for Cat Tail I get a list of a lot of plants with the similar common name: http://garden.org/plants/searc...

Searching for coleus-
Searching "coleus" gets 3 hits http://garden.org/plants/brows...
Searching for "Solenostemon " gets 25 pages of hits http://garden.org/plants/searc...

Karen

The presence of those three plants makes the word "Coleus" a legal genus name, which it isn't. All three of those plants will need to be edited to their correct botanical name. I'll look into that right now.

I handled it, and a search for Coleus now results in the full collection of results that you would expect.

I'm really not stupid, I have a high IQ. But plant names and classifications just confussle me!

Dave, are you saying that the search engine should only search a legal genus name? e.g. A search for "coneflower" brings up 9 pages of hits, mostly echinacea but also other plants with that common name, like ratabida. OK. But coneflower is not a legal genus name, it's a common name. So why does it search common name coneflower but not common mane coleus?

I'm really not this dumb... am I?

Karen

OK! More hits + better search!

Karen

A lot of people don't know that Coleus used to be the genus for the plant. It's now split amongst Solenostemon, Plectranthus and others, and Coleus is now a synonym.

And I think most people, casual home gardeners, never heard of Solenostemon, yet alone know how to spell it. Most folks just know them as coleus and that's what they're more likely to search.

Karen

and I'm glad you made this report.

These little quirks will probably continue to pop up as the database grows. So we depend on Dave's magic fingers to accommodate them.

That is truly what makes your sites better than most, Dave- a webmaster who is himself a gardener and farmer who actually grows plants and understands as opposed to some bureaucratic webmaster whose goal is to just "put out fires" keep things from crashing.

Karen

Thank you for your kind words and confidence Karen.