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I have proposed a new Category - Herbaria of the World. Herbaria are locations where collections of plant specimens, used by botanists for research, are maintained. There are a number of famous herbaria, the Kew in England and MOBOT in Missouri, which are rather easily located due to their size (the Kew has approximately 500,000 specimens). I am looking to waymark those that are larger, such as those mentioned, and the smaller herbaria, usually associated with Universities or other facilities of higher eduction. The main requirement for listing will be the identificaiton of the herbaria's assigned abbreviation, Eastern Kentucky University herbarium, for instance, is EKU.

Would like whatever input might be out there and would like to see if there is enough interest to get a couple of officers.

Thank you,

I'm about to sound really ignorant, so please excuse that...

Are herbaria registered establishments?  Are there many?  Is there some other defining factor other than a collection of plants used for research?  I've never even heard the word, but based on the description here the greenhouse my neighbor uses to cross-polinate his squash plants to see "what he gets next year" would seem to fit, although I'm sure that's not what you're really looking for.

Please educate me!

biosearch:

I have proposed a new Category - Herbaria of the World. Herbaria are locations where collections of plant specimens, used by botanists for research, are maintained. There are a number of famous herbaria, the Kew in England and MOBOT in Missouri, which are rather easily located due to their size (the Kew has approximately 500,000 specimens). I am looking to waymark those that are larger, such as those mentioned, and the smaller herbaria, usually associated with Universities or other facilities of higher eduction. The main requirement for listing will be the identificaiton of the herbaria's assigned abbreviation, Eastern Kentucky University herbarium, for instance, is EKU. Would like whatever input might be out there and would like to see if there is enough interest to get a couple of officers. Thank you,

Actually I think you might be missing a 0 in the number Kew has... MOBOT has according to their website ". As of 1 January 2002 the collection contained 5,219,216 specimens (387,041 bryophytes and 4,832,175 vascular plants)."  I am sure MOBOT's has grown substantially since 2002.

Is the proper word "Heraria" or is it "Herbarium"  or they interchangable words?

yramc600:

I'm about to sound really ignorant, so please excuse that...

Are herbaria registered establishments?  Are there many?  Is there some other defining factor other than a collection of plants used for research?  I've never even heard the word, but based on the description here the greenhouse my neighbor uses to cross-polinate his squash plants to see "what he gets next year" would seem to fit, although I'm sure that's not what you're really looking for.

Please educate me!

Trust me, you don't sound ignorant. Before I started working on my BS I had no idea what one was either. I've since become very knowledgable, many biologist only have a passing knowledge of them.

There are a good number of them. In the SE United States there is an organization for herbaria of the SE, persently there are 55 herbaria that are members of SERNEC. Worldwide, I have no idea.

The defining factor would be the herbarium's acronym, usually no more than five letters and usually an abbreviation of the school or botanical gardens where it is located. Mississippi State University Herbarium is MISSA, Louisianna State University Herbarium is LSU (surprise, surprise) and the mycology collection at LSU is LSUM. If it doesn't have an acronym it isn't an herbarium.

Herbaria are collections of pressed, dried and mounted specimens that are used to catalog flora of an area, identify specific biological communities, research species in order to better understand phylogeny (study of evolutionary relationships), systematics (study of life on the planet and the relationships among living thing over time), an other research topics.

Herbarium specimens, for vascular plants, are generally mounted on heavy paper (the standard is 11.5" x 16.5"). They are stored in cabinets specifically made for herbarium specimens.

Herbaria have been around for a long time. It was "state of the art" science at one time. Collections have, however, begun to decrease with the changes in the sciences. Many biologist no longer see the importance of herbaria. Maintenance for these collections is important to keep historical data preserved for the future.

Hope this helps.

BruceS:

Actually I think you might be missing a 0 in the number Kew has... MOBOT has according to their website ". As of 1 January 2002 the collection contained 5,219,216 specimens (387,041 bryophytes and 4,832,175 vascular plants)."  I am sure MOBOT's has grown substantially since 2002.

Is the proper word "Heraria" or is it "Herbarium"  or they interchangable words?

Yes you're right. The Kew has 7 million specimens, they have over 350,000 type specimens alone. Sorry. And MOBOT has 5 million (I was missing a 0 in the MOBOT number and attributed it to the Kew instead, mistakes like that in the herbarium would cause me much aggrivation, to say the least). And yes there is no doubt that the herbarium at MOBOT is considerably larger at this point. Unfortnately keeping exact numbers can be difficult. Accession numbers, much like card catalog numbers in a library, should be a good record, however specimens come up missing, are out on loan and never come back, etc. Databasing collections is still an ongoing process at many herbaria. I can't imagine that it would be a problem at MOBOT, but one never knows.

Herbaria vs. Herbarium. There are nearly 150 herbaria in the SE United States. One of the more important is the herbarium at MOBOT, which isn't in the SE. Best way I could think of describing it. Herbaria isn't necessarily plural for herbarium, but close.

One of the issues with herbaria is that they are usually tucked away in the least used buildings at Universities, Colleges, Botanical Gardens, etc. Sometimes finding them requires near dectective skills. It would be nice to have them all waymarked, if for no other reason than to let me have a list with locations should I need to visit on (hehehe). Bringing notice/interest to them is really the major idea.

Hope this helps some.

yramc600:

I'm about to sound really ignorant, so please excuse that...

I just thought of this. The closest herbarium to you might possibly be at Western Carolina University. However, I don't know if they have one. Many Universities have gotten rid of theirs. UofL is presently getting ready to get rid of theirs.

biosearch:

Hope this helps.

VERY MUCH!

I like it.  If only to further educate the waymarking community!  These sound like really cool places.

I attend East Carolina University...we have huge greenhouses on campus, so I'll have to do some nosing around to see if there's one attached to those.

A quick Google search found one at NC State and one at UNC Chapel Hill.

The one at Chapel Hill is fairly well know, at least in the Herbarium/Botanical/Taxonomy community. It si nowhere as large as MOBOT, for instance, but it is certainly a decent size. The greenhouse would not be the best place to start searching, call the biology department. They should be able to give you a contact name, if there is an herbarium and they contact you with one of the curators (or herbarium gnomes, usually student workers who work in the herbarium, spend days in dark cavernouse places with no light and no signs of civilization, perhaps not that bad, but...). They may even be happy to have you go and visit, visits are rare in the smaller herbaria. And there is a good chance that they will be interested in waymarking. If you think about it, herbaria are all about cataloging items and their locations, in this case plants, in the case of waymarking, everything. Not only that, but when one is out collecting one runs into some very interesting people, places and things.

Alan Weakley is the curator at Chapel Hill. Great guy, been in the community or, well, a long time. He could tell you where every herbaria in NC is, quite possibly the world. Appalachian State has Zack Murrell, if you get around that way tell him that Robert sent you to bother him. NC has some fairly active programs.

To get an idea of what is in the Southeastern U.S. Take a look at www.SERNEC.org. It only lists the herbaria that are members of SERNEC so there may be more in each state that are not listed. Certainly some of the smaller collections may not be.

Remember, an acronym for the herbarium is required, so smaller teaching collections will not be considered herbaria for this purpose. That may change in the future when the requirements are revisited at some point, but for now that is one of the standards.

Glad this helps. Herbaria are, I'm sure I've mentioned this, becoming sort of an "old" idea, believed by some to be less important than they once where. Whatever the case, whether one considers it in the realm of natural history collection or a valid scientific tool, they are most certainly needed and referenced by botanist constantly.

Somethng that may be of interest to add would be the primary interest of the curator or asst. curators. I can not remember what Weakley works with, but Zack Murrell at Appalachian State is a specialist in Cornus (Dogwoods). Every botanist has an interest in something specific and centers their work around that Genus.

Too much information?

yramc600:

biosearch:

Hope this helps.

VERY MUCH!

I like it.  If only to further educate the waymarking community!  These sound like really cool places.

I attend East Carolina University...we have huge greenhouses on campus, so I'll have to do some nosing around to see if there's one attached to those.

A quick Google search found one at NC State and one at UNC Chapel Hill.

Forgot to add, some universities have more than one herbarium. Harvar, for instance, has six collections. Whether they are housed in the same location or not I do not know. I plan on learning from this as well.

I can't imagine trying to curator/keep track of/keep insects out of an herbarium with a couple of million specimens. 40,000 is bad enough.

I think I found the official herbarium index.
    http://sciweb.nybg.org/science2/IndexHerbariorum.asp
Click on search near the top left.

It also seems to me like there are several herbaria that don't have acronyms. The acronyms are assigned by  the International Association for Plant Taxonomy. So ones that aren't in the Index Herbariorum would not have acronyms. You could limit the category to ones listed in the Index Herbariorum to make it simple to decide if it is in or out. Just an idea.

Yes you are correct. I can't believe I forgot about it as I'm listed in the thing (putting my work e-mail out there for the world to find). I tried to reply to this once already so it may eventually get there, the forums have been giving me problems lately. Anyway, since that attempted post I've re-read ggmorton's post and think that a requirement of being in IH is a great idea. Thanks for that....

So now I have a category, seems that people think that it is worthwhile, and I have enrollment open, what next. Would any of you that seem to like the idea of this category be interested in becoming officers?

I'm VERY new (3 days and counting) to this Waymarking thing...but I'm willing to help in any way I can...as long as I can ask LOTS of dumb questions along the way!

This one seems like it'd be fun

Oh, I learned something.  I work at the University of Arizona and searched our website and we have a herbaria (ARIZ, go figure). This sounds like an interesting category but are they all open to the public?

Open to the public, some are, most arn't. However, if you get ahold of the curator they can open them up for you or let you in during the hours they are there. This is a common occurance for herbaria. Visitors, botanists/taxonomists/ecologist generally, are granted access on a regular basis for research purposes. I don't know an herbarium out there, however, that won't welcome someone interested in plants, just to introduce them to what it is all about. Find out who is the curator, usually the universities botanist/plant taxonomist or at least one of them, and ask him if he'd be interested in having someone show you around, just because. My guess is he'll get some undergrad worker to give you a tour.

I signed up for the group.

Since most of these are not available to the public, I would reccomend not requiring people to get tours of these.

To waymark one, you should get a photo of the appropriate building and building sign (if it has one). The sign may not even mention a herbarium. That is ok. List the acronym for the herbarium and the official name that are from the directory. Also obviously take coordinates for the main building entrance.

Of course, they would not have to have a tour, or even see the actual door of the herbarium. Ours, for instance, is so out of the way, even when people are given precise directions they wander around outside the door trying to figure out where it is. Main door to the building will be fine for coordinates. Picture of the building it is housed in if not a seperate structure. Herbarium acronym, and any other information that they can come up with.

I think it would be nice to at least list who to contact should someone especially want to visit, even if a visit is not required.  If a waymarker has gone through the research to figure out where the place is, surely they could find a contact name.

yramc600:

I think it would be nice to at least list who to contact should someone especially want to visit, even if a visit is not required.  If a waymarker has gone through the research to figure out where the place is, surely they could find a contact name.

All of the information needed is in the herbarium directory. Contact info, location information, and  official acronym. So if we provide a link to that then it should be a simple click. Or we could just list it again in the waymark info.

yramc600:

I think it would be nice to at least list who to contact should someone especially want to visit, even if a visit is not required.  If a waymarker has gone through the research to figure out where the place is, surely they could find a contact name.

I would avoid requiring the contact person.  People change positions and then the waymark is out of date.  Only way the waymarker would know if there was a change of people is by looking at the register and if that link is required then anyone wanting to know who to contact will get the most current information anyway.

BruceS:

yramc600:

I think it would be nice to at least list who to contact should someone especially want to visit, even if a visit is not required.  If a waymarker has gone through the research to figure out where the place is, surely they could find a contact name.

I would avoid requiring the contact person.  People change positions and then the waymark is out of date.  Only way the waymarker would know if there was a change of people is by looking at the register and if that link is required then anyone wanting to know who to contact will get the most current information anyway.

Sounds good to me.  I just thought that some way to gain more information should be made available, that would cover it.

So we're decided then? Now all I need are some officers, right? Then I can creat a group, no? Anyone interested in officership?

Herbaria's, Si! es muy bueno.
I have been to many in Mexico and the USA.
I find good supplies of Herba Bueana in Mexico herbaria's.
And some others.

I also visit the one in Silver City for OSHA(bear root) it only grows above 9000 feet.
BEAR CREEK HERBS
Some Red Root and many other tinctures.


Send me an invite.

biosearch:

So we're decided then? Now all I need are some officers, right? Then I can creat a group, no? Anyone interested in officership?

Late in chiming in...

I got a question. Would Blaschka Glass Models of Plants count?

A Botanical Museum collection presented by the Harvard Museum of Natural History

This unique collection of over 3,000 models was created by the glass artisans, Leopold Blaschka and his son, Rudolph. The commission began in 1886, continued for five decades, and represents more than 830 plant species.

http://www.hmnh.harvard.edu/exhibitions/glassflowers.html

team farkle 7:

biosearch:

So we're decided then? Now all I need are some officers, right? Then I can creat a group, no? Anyone interested in officership?

Late in chiming in...

I got a question. Would Blaschka Glass Models of Plants count?

A Botanical Museum collection presented by the Harvard Museum of Natural History

This unique collection of over 3,000 models was created by the glass artisans, Leopold Blaschka and his son, Rudolph. The commission began in 1886, continued for five decades, and represents more than 830 plant species.

http://www.hmnh.harvard.edu/exhibitions/glassflowers.html

Is it listed here:
    http://sciweb.nybg.org/science2/IndexHerbariorum.asp
If so, then yes.
If not, then no.

I see 5 different herbaria listed for Harvard on there.