11. IDENTIFICATION AND HERBARIUM SPECIMENS

It is critical to the value of the seed collections that the species is accurately identified.  Voucher material is essential to enable the accurate identification of seed collections.  Vegetative material and close-up photographs can occasionally be used, but the most useful voucher material for this program is a set of quality herbarium specimens (pressed, dried plant specimens) for each collection.  Therefore, collectors are required to collect herbarium voucher specimens for all Seeds of Success seed collections and to enter comprehensive identification notes on the field data form including where each specimen was sent and any additional identification notes.  Do not mount the voucher materials on a herbarium sheet or make a herbarium label for the collection. 

Guidelines for Shipment

Send all voucher material marked with the seed collection number and a copy of the correlating field data forms. 

For most collecting teams, the easiest approach to their MSB collections will be to send duplicate specimens to RBG, Kew (to the same address as for the seed collections) where updated herbarium labels will be printed and subsequent distributions to the National Herbarium at the Smithsonian Institution and regional herbaria can be organized.  If it is convenient, please include these specimens with the next scheduled shipment to RBG, Kew; ideally, they will be sent in a separate cardboard package from seed collections.

For voucher specimens of collections sent to Bend, it is the collectors’ responsibility to send out all vouchers with associated field collection data forms.  Again, these should be unmounted without a label and should include the completed field collection data forms.

Herbarium specimens are valuable additional outputs from the collecting program in their own right, and collectors should take three to four representative herbarium specimens for each seed collection made.  These specimens can be held at the most appropriate regional, national and international herbaria where they will be available for study or for classification by visiting taxonomists.  Close-up photographs, especially of flowers or organs that may be damaged by pressing and drying, are welcome and should be sent to the herbarium coordinators with the collection number clearly written on the reverse or, in the event of digital files, cited in the file name.

Collectors wishing to learn the correct technique for herbarium specimen preparation should accompany an experienced botanist taking specimens in the field.  SOS program collectors should attend an SOS training session (see Section 2).  Literature available to consult includes: Bridson and Forman (1992); Radford, Dickison, Massey and Bell (1974); and Ross (1994).

For those species that will not be in bloom during seed collecting time, it is suggested that a herbarium voucher specimen be taken during a preliminary trip to the population.  Herbarium specimens must be taken from the exact population earlier in the season (e.g. for the purposes of identification and population monitoring).  The herbarium material must truly represent the individuals from which seed was collected.  If a preliminary trip is not made and material for a herbarium voucher specimen is inadequate at seed collection time, collectors should follow the instructions in the paragraph below.

Record a representative individual(s) of the population with GPS so that herbarium specimens can be taken from those individuals in the following season when vegetative and fertile material would be available.  Identification should still be carried out in the field by an acknowledged expert familiar with the species (i.e. lead collecting botanist).

Verification of herbarium voucher specimens can be made by one of the options outlined below.

If you have colleagues at local or regional herbaria that are willing to verify your specimens, please indicate on the field data form that you intend to pass a duplicate set of herbarium specimens to a local taxonomist (together with a copy of the field data form) for verification.  Do not assume that all herbaria are willing to provide this service.  However, if the specimens are of good quality, and it is explained that the transferred set of specimens can be incorporated into the herbarium, many taxonomists are willing to help by confirming or updating the collector’s identification.  If the taxonomist verifies the specimens, it is the collector’s responsibility to share the verification results (collection number and complete scientific name together with the month verified and the name of the verifying taxonomist and herbarium) with the National Collections Data Manager for dissemination to all other parties holding that Seeds of Success collection.

If you do not have local or regional herbarium colleagues that can help with the verification of the herbarium specimens, please forward the complete set of duplicates to RBG, Kew (to the same address as for the seed collections).  Kew will prepare herbarium labels with the collector’s field identification and pass the duplicates to the Kew herbarium for verification.  The determinations will be attached to the specimens, which will then be separated for the Kew herbarium, Smithsonian Institution herbarium, and regional herbaria, as numbers of duplicates allow and according to recommendations by the collecting teams.  See Appendix 6 for the herbaria that have been identified for distribution in your state to make sure you collect the proper number of voucher specimens.

USDA PLANTS Database is the taxonomic standard used by Seeds of Success and can be accessed on the web at http://www.plants.usda.gov.  Identify collections to the subspecies and/or variety level.  One goal of the program is to identify the varieties of widespread species that are found in each ecoregion.  The SOS website provides a tutorial on advanced querying of the USDA PLANTS Database under ‘Training.’