ABSTRACT
No other area of equal size in a temperate climate can match the park’s amazing diversity of plants, animals, and invertebrates. Over 10,000 species have been documented in the park: Scientists believe an additional 90,000 species may live here.” (National Park Service, “Nature & Science”)
In particular, the park is renowned to scientists and naturalists for its one hundred species of native trees, “more than in any other North American National Park” (National Park Service, “Nature & Science”) and for being the salamander capital of the world. At least thirty species of salamanders live in the park, including twenty-four lungless species that breathe through their skin; some of these live nowhere else (National Park Service, “Amphibians”).
