> animals presumably outrank plants in terms of moral standing.

In aggregate I probably agree but one thing I've wondered, especially in the last year as I started gardening during lockdown, is if that's really universally true. Large, long-lived plants - redwoods, oaks, saguaros, and so on - seem very close to the same niche in the plant kingdom humans occupy in the animal one. They exert significant energy to cultivate and modify their environment; they gather and store resources they do not immediately need; they change "behavioral" patterns significantly and cyclically over the course of their life; they maintain vast communication networks.

I have no doubt a pig "outranks" a mosquito. But I also suspect a redwood outranks a mosquito. The middle is all fuzzy though - where does my cucumber (which exhibits relatively complex reproductive behavior to attract pollinators, and expresses significant "wants" in terms of vining and leaf facing) lie in relation to mosquitos, or aphids, or bees?