The same grocery plant wears many names. “Kale” in English is not the only word on the seed packet in Madrid or Bratislava — and many trackers ignore the local names people actually type when they search.
Thrive’s edge is simple: when the atlas has the data, a plant card can carry a Latin name plus English, Spanish, and Slovak names so search and travel work across languages. These are food-data cards for grocery plants — not a wild forage guide, and not a clinical herb page.
Why Latin + local names?
Latin (botanical) names keep one plant distinct when supermarket labels disagree. Local names are how people search and shop in their own language. Thrive shows both when the names exist in the atlas — and does not invent a Spanish or Slovak label just to fill a slot.
That helps travellers, plant-shifters who know a food under another name, and SK/ES readers discovering the Living Atlas without forcing every page into a full second-language article.
What Thrive shows
On a plant page, look for a names line in this spirit:
Latin · EN … · ES … · SK …
Languages appear when data exists. This guide’s title and body stay EN primary. ES and SK are a discoverability layer on the cards and in the UI — not a full Slovak or Spanish rewrite of every literacy page unless that is asked for later.
If a language is missing on a card, that means the atlas does not have a verified local name yet — not that you should guess one.
Example walkthrough: kale (and two friends)
Open kale. The live names line includes:
- Latin Brassica oleracea var. sabellica
- EN Kale · Curly kale · Leaf kale
- ES Col rizada · Kale · Berza rizada
- SK Kel · Kapusta kučeravá · Kel kučeravý
Try the same pattern on:
- Rolled oats — Avena sativa; ES avena en copos; SK ovsené vločky
- Cooked lentils — Lens culinaris; ES lentejas; SK šošovica
Search by the name you know. If the atlas has it, the card should surface. Start from Foods if you want to browse.
How to try it in one minute
- Open https://thrivenutrition.app/foods/.
- Search a name you know in English, Spanish, or Slovak — or open kale as a known-good example.
- Read the Latin + local names line at the top, then the per-100 g table underneath.
- Change UI language if you want to see which name group leads after load — and notice that shop country is a separate control.
That is the whole loop: name you know → card → food data. No forage workflow.
Country, UI language, and name emphasis
After load, the UI language can change which name group leads on screen. Country can default the UI language; a manual language override sticks until the next country change. For SEO and first-byte HTML, the name order stays EN → ES → SK so crawlers see a stable line.
That is UI behaviour — not a claim that every plant has every translation, and not a promise that switching language rewrites the science table.
Shops still follow country
Language is not shop country. Switching the UI to Spanish does not move your supermarket links to Spain by itself. Shops follow the country setting; names follow language (and available data). Keep those two dials separate when you travel — especially on days when you are assembling a plate from a hotel fridge or a mini-market. See also travel and offline.
Grocery plants only — not wild ID
These cards are for foods you buy and cook (or assemble without a kitchen). They are not a guide to picking and eating wild plants from an ID guess. If a caution line says grocery brassica, dry pulse, or “not a wild forage note,” believe it. Prefer the name on the pack and the atlas card over a roadside guess.
Answer-ready
Thrive plant pages can show a Latin name plus local names in English, Spanish, and Slovak when those names exist in the atlas. That helps travellers and anyone searching by the name they know. The pages are food-data cards for grocery plants — not a guide to eating wild plants from an ID guess.
Start in the atlas: https://thrivenutrition.app/foods/.