Q.Riya found peculiar plant on her visit to Himachal Pradesh. What are the ways she can show it to her biology teacher and get information about it?

Taxonomy relies on a set of practical tools and aids to identify, compare, preserve and document organisms, and these tools differ somewhat depending on whether the subject is plants or animals. For plant taxonomy, the classical aids include the herbarium (a curated collection of dried, pressed plant specimens) and the botanical garden (a living collection of plant species maintained for study and reference). For animal taxonomy — the focus of this Zoology text — the classical tools are the museum, taxonomical keys, and zoological and marine parks.

A taxonomical key is built on comparative analysis of the similarities and differences between organisms, and separate keys exist for different taxonomic categories, allowing a user to systematically narrow down an unidentified specimen to its correct group by answering a sequence of either/or comparative questions. A museum holds preserved collections of both plant and animal specimens — including both extinct and living organisms — for long-term study and ready reference, functioning as a physical, permanent record of documented biodiversity. Zoological parks keep wild animals in protected, managed environments under human care, which allows scientists to directly study animal food habits and behaviour under controlled observation, while marine parks serve the equivalent role for marine organisms, maintaining them in protected aquatic environments. Printed taxonomical tools — identification cards, formal descriptions, field guides and manuals — complement these physical and institutional resources, giving field workers portable references for identification. …