The 1st and 2nd characters of an Element code (ELCODE) for a nonvascular plant were based on group:
The 3rd through 5th characters were an abbreviation for the order or family to which that Element belonged. The abbreviation was the first three letters of the name as listed in the standard reference.
The following table gives the meaning of the first five characters of the codes:
The last 5 characters in the Element code for a nonvascular plant were a sequentially generated numeric code, with the 6th and 7th values assigned to genus, and the 8th and 9th values used for species. The 10th character was a sequentially generated numeric code that identified the subspecies/variety; a zero (0) was used if the Element was a full species.
|
Character(s) |
Representation |
Range of Values |
|
6 - 7 |
Genus |
00 - 99 |
|
8 - 9 |
Species |
00 - 99 |
|
10 |
Subspecies/ Variety |
1 - 9 |
Because the coding of many nonvascular groups was not completed, interim codes not following the above conventions may have been used by some agencies.
NOTE: In some cases, sequential number codes were used for characters 3 through 10 to provide unique Element codes for international agencies.