Scattered throughout the scrub are bright, open patches of bare sand dotted with small herbaceous plants and lichens. The combination of plants that occur in scrub varies from site to site. Sand pine scrub is sometimes open and airy or forest-like with a dense overstory of mature sand pines and a shrub layer underneath. On more excessively drained scrub sites you may find nearly pure stands of Florida rosemary. Oak scrub can be dense or open.
Coastal scrub can be treeless.
Some of the shrubs, small plants, and trees that live in Florida scrub occur nowhere else in the world. Among these organisms are forty species of plants, four species of vertebrates, and at least forty-six species of arthropods that are found in Florida scrub and nowhere else. These species are well adapted to life in the dry, sandy, nutrient-poor scrub soil. Florida scrub is found on coastal and inland ridges throughout Florida. These ridges also support other dry, but very different habitats, such as sandhill and scrubby flatwoods.