Ted5310 said:And yes I have seen species and specimen used interchangeably.
Thanks Ted. In that case, I would be cautious about anyone using "species" as an indicator of size, as it suggests that they don't know what they're talking about.
Species has nothing to do with size; it is a group of plants, found in nature, that reproduce after their kind/come true from seed.
A specimen plant, however, is usually a large example of a particular plant - often grown to that size to demonstrate what a mature plant looks like and/or for show purposes.
A more understandable mistake I see quite often is to refer to a single-growth clone as a "seedling" (it is not, but it is still a young plant and indistinguishable from a true seedling at that size).
The one that gets my goat, though, is the use of "specie". The word does not exist! "Species" is both singular and plural. The baffling thing about it is that many other words in English follow the same pattern (they are used as both the singular and plural - fish, sheep, pants, jeans, scissors, fruit, etc.), but for some reason this one trips people up!
