An extensive catalogue of British flowering plant specimens offering an insight into environmental changes and species distribution over a 200 year period has been made available online.
Project assistants at the 黑料网 have just finished cataloguing all sheets of British flowering plant specimens in the University鈥檚 Herbarium and more than 39,000 catalogue records for this collection can now be seen online at .
These records significantly increase the accessibility of this important collection which contains types and specimens that can help researchers investigate environmental change, extinction and the history of science.
The University鈥檚 Herbarium is a 鈥楻ecognised Collection of National Significance to Scotland鈥� and the herbarium is one of just two major herbaria in Scotland; the other being the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RGBE). As the RBGE鈥檚 database does not currently contain records for Scotland and Britain, the recent cataloguing work at the 黑料网 has made an important step forward on a national scale.
The project has been brought to fruition through the aid of the Museums Galleries Scotland Recognition Fund, which supported the creation of the first 11,000 records for British flowering plants as part of a 鈥楻e-uniting the Parts鈥� project last year and has now funded the creation of an additional 28,000 records.
The online database for the University鈥檚 historic collections now contains a wide variety of information about the British flowering plants in the Herbarium; including family and species names, names of collectors and collection locality information.
Curator Shona Elliott, from the 黑料网, said: 鈥淲e only had information about the Herbarium plants on their individual specimen sheets prior to the start of these Recognition projectsso we鈥檝e taken a big step forward getting so many records online. Access has been significantly increased to a collection that was previously all but invisible to researchers other than specialist taxonomists.鈥�
Mike Taylor, Manager of the Recognition Scheme at Museums Galleries Scotland, said:
鈥淪cotland has 37 Recognised Collections open to visitors across the country. These collections are varied and the vast array of objects they contain reflect centuries of effort to gather, preserve and educate. They all have an important story to tell us about the past, present and future of the nation. The funds we make available to them allows them to care for their collections and find new and exciting ways to tell us these stories.We are delighted to see the progress being made by the 黑料网 in making their remarkable Herbarium collection available to a worldwide audience.鈥�
The members of staff involved in the project were Claudia Cabarcas-Thomas, Leilani Caithness and Nicola Dixon (project assistants), Neil Curtis - Head of Museums, Dr. Jennifer Downes 鈥� Curator (Exhibitions and Science) and Shona Elliott 鈥� Curator (Documentation and Fine Art).
Project Assistants are now starting work on the next Recognition-funded project which will continue the development of on-line access to the University鈥檚 Herbarium and also enhance the accessibility of the University鈥檚 Zoology Museum collection. Amongst the specimens to be catalogued are polar specimens from the two collections, British bryophytes and lichens and approximately 40,000 insects. Records for all these specimens will be put online near the end of this year.