Indigenous

   

The word indigenous has several, related meanings:

  • The native people of a place; see Indigenous people.
  • In biology, indigenous means native to a place or biota, in contrast to any one of several terms meaning not native to a place (non-native, alien, adventive, introduced) and differentiated from endemic. A species that is endemic is unique to that place, found naturally nowhere else. A species that is indigenous is native, but not unique in the sense that it is also native to other locations as well. Thus, a species that is native to California, but found naturally in Oregon and Washington as well (native to the West Coast of the United States) is indigenous to California. A species found only in the British Isles, is endemic to those islands.

Retrieved from "http://www.centipedia.com/articles/Indigenous"

This page has been accessed 297 times. This page was last modified 18:50, 28 Aug 2004. All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License (see Copyrights for details).