Question: How do scientists classify plants and animals?

Answer:  Scientists classify plants and animals into a number of groups. These are known as taxonomic groups. These taxonomic groups are often broken down into groups and sub-groups.

There are five kingdoms of living things:

1. Plants: which are grouped into (a) flowering plants; (b) non-flowering plants. Both of these are known as vascular plants. (We have not included such things as mosses and liverworts.)

2. Animals: which are grouped into (a) invertebrates (do not have backbones); (b) vertebrates (have backbones).

The invertebrates are divided into molluscs, worms, echinoderms, coelenterates and arthropods. The last group is divided again into insects, arachnids (spiders), myriapods (millipedes) and crustaceans.

The vertebrates are divided into fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals.

3. Fungi.

4. Bacteria, sometimes grouped under the name Monera to include blue-green algae along with bacteria.

5. Protists, sometimes known as Protoctista which includes amoeba and filamentous algae.

If you look on our web site: https://www.zephyrus.co.uk and go to Biology Facts, you will be able to find some more details about the individual kingdoms, including lots of illustrations.