Non-flowering plants mostly fall into one of these groups: ferns, liverworts, mosses, hornworts, whisk ferns, club mosses, horsetails, conifers, cycads, and ginkgo.
Non-flowering plants are those that do not ever produce flowers. Some non-flowering plants, called gymnosperms, still produce seeds while others use spores for reproduction.
Gymnosperms
Gymnosperms are any type of vascular plant that reproduce via an exposed seed. While most flowering plants, known as angiosperms, have a seed enclosed in an ovary or fruit, gymnosperms (which means "naked seeds") do not have covers on their seeds.
Some examples of non-flowering plants that are classified as gymnosperms include:
Conifers
Found all over the world, conifers are largely woody plants, with trees making up the vast majority of conifers. They bear male and female cones that pollinate and spread.
Conifers include:
- Junipers
- Cedars
- Cypresses
- Firs
- Pines
- Redwoods
- Yews
- Spruce
- Larches
- Kauris
Cycads
Ancient plants dating to the Jurassic era, cycads are primarily found today in tropical or subtropical climates. Cycads are characterized by having thick trunks and large divided leaves; they have visual similarities to palms and tree-ferns.
Ginkgo
Commonly known as the maidenhair tree, Gingko Biloba, is the only remaining species of the Ginkgophyta plant division. While they only grow in the wild in China, they have been cultivated around the world. They have green fan-shaped notched leaves that yellow in cooler weather. The male trees produce tiny cones that produce pollen; the females, once pollinated and fertilized, produce seeds with a noxious odor.
Gnetophytes
This plant division is fairly broad, including approximately 70 species, all of which have vessel elements transporting water within the plants. Examples of gentophyte non-flowering plants are Ephedra, Gentum and Welwitschia.
Other Non-Flowering Plants
Unlike Gymnosperms, all of these other non-flowering plants reproduce using spores; they do not produce seeds. Examples of some of the most commonly known non-flowering plants are ferns, mosses and liverworts.
Spores are tiny living cells which leave the plant on which they originate and are pollinated and fertilized away from the original organism.