Botany Photo of the Day will have brief written entries on weekends, holidays and my vacations from April through September. – Daniel
To borrow a phrase: your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to solve a small mystery. Try using a search engine to discover the distribution of seaside plantain (or goose-tongue) – I’ll almost guarantee that if you visit three different web sites, you’ll get at least two different answers.
From GRIN (generally the best source I’ve found for global distributions):
http://www.ars-grin.gov/cgi-bin/npgs/html/taxon.pl?28789
AFRICA
Northern Africa: Algeria; Morocco
ASIA-TEMPERATE
Western Asia: Afghanistan; Iran; Syria [w.]; Turkey
Siberia: Russian Federation – Buryatia, Chita, Irkutsk, Omsk, Tuva, Tyumen
Soviet Middle Asia: Kazakhstan; Kyrgyzstan; Turkmenistan
Mongolia: Mongolia
EUROPE
Northern Europe: Denmark; Faroe Islands; Finland; Iceland; Ireland; Norway; Sweden; United Kingdom
Middle Europe: Austria; Belgium; Czechoslovakia; Germany; Hungary; Netherlands; Poland; Switzerland
East Europe: Belarus; Estonia; Latvia; Lithuania; Moldova; Russian Federation – European part; Ukraine [incl. Krym]
Southeastern Europe: Italy; Romania
Southwestern Europe: France; Portugal; Spain
NORTHERN AMERICA
Subarctic America: Canada – Northwest Territory, Yukon Territory; Greenland; United States – Alaska
Eastern Canada: Canada – New Brunswick, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, Ontario [n.], Prince Edward Island, Quebec
Western Canada: Canada – Alberta, British Columbia [w.], Manitoba [n.e.]
Northeastern U.S.A.: United States – Connecticut [s.], Maine [s.], Massachusetts [e.], New Hampshire [s.e.], New Jersey, New York [s.e.], Rhode Island
Northwestern U.S.A.: United States – Oregon [w.], Washington [w.]
Southwestern U.S.A.: United States – California
SOUTHERN AMERICA
Southern South America: Argentina – Chubut, Mendoza, Neuquen, Rio Negro, Santa Cruz, Tierra del Fuego; Chile
From Jepson, Flora of California:
http://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/cgi-bin/get_JM_treatment.pl?5625,5626,5635
Bioregional distribution: North Coast, Central Coast, San Francisco Bay Area, n Channel Islands
Distribution outside California: to Alaska, ne N.America
But Jepson only ever gives North American distributions, not global.
From Plants For a Future:
http://www.pfaf.org/database/plants.php?Plantago+maritima
Western Europe, including Britain, from Scandanavia south and east to Spain, Hungary and Russia
But they only appear to give the European distribution (somewhat odd, as PFAF usually does better than this!).
http://linnaeus.nrm.se/flora/di/plantagina/plant/planmarv.jpg