Chapter 10: Published sources of information on wild plant species

I. Thormann
Bioversity International, Rome, Italy
E-mail: i.thormann(at)cgiar.org

This chapter is a synthesis of new knowledge, procedures, best practices and references for collecting plant diversity since the publication of the 1995 volume Collecting Plant Genetic Diversity: Technical Guidelines, edited by Luigi Guarino, V. Ramanatha Rao and Robert Reid, and published by CAB International on behalf of the International Plant Genetic Resources Institute (IPGRI) (now Bioversity International), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the World Conservation Union (IUCN) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). The original text for Chapter 10: Published Sources of Information on Wild Plant Species, authored by H. D. V. Prendergast, has been made available online courtesy of CABI. The 2011 update of the Technical Guidelines, edited by L. Guarino, V. Ramanatha Rao and E. Goldberg, has been made available courtesy of Bioversity International.

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	Screen shot from eFloras web site (3 Oct. 2011, www.efloras.org)

Abstract

Chapter 10 of the 1995 edition of the Technical Guidelines provided key works and extensive lists of references useful to collectors for locating and recognizing the plants they would go out to collect. The methodology provided in 1995 suggested using the information provided as a guide to more specific publications. This approach to obtaining published information has changed with the advent of the internet, which has become a fast and primary means of locating and accessing relevant resources. Many of the key works listed in 1995 have kept pace with the development of information technology and have become available online. This revision of chapter 10 provides an update of key works and floras, including their online availability, as well as links to other relevant resources.

Introduction

Germplasm collectors need to locate and recognize the material they are going to collect. This requires them to be able to identify plants, to determine their accepted botanical name and to have knowledge about where they grow. In the first version of the Technical Guidelines, the aim of this chapter, on published sources of information on wild plant species, had been to support collectors in this regard by providing a guide to the world

• taxonomic literature on vascular (especially flowering) plants

• ecological literature on vascular (especially flowering) plants

• literature on identification of seeds and fruits

It focused on printed literature and described a methodology that should lead to relevant and necessary resources for researchers planning to collect wild species.

The methodology started with some key works, considered “essential to every collector and which act as „signposts‟ to the rest of the relevant botanical literature”, and was supported by listing large-scale floristic, ecological and bibliographic works. The collector was supposed to identify from these basic publications other more specific and focused literature. In order to reduce the literature to a manageable but effective minimum, only major works were included in the lists, and publications referring to just one country or one group of plants were excluded. They should be easily located via the key works listed. Today the quantity of published resources as further increased, but given the advent of the internet, it has become much easier and faster to locate resources. Any reference to publications specific to a country or plant group, or the publication itself, can today be retrieved through a targeted internet search. The right combination of search terms typed into the search box of an internet browser can immediately yield important information.

A methodology to retrieve published information on wild species today would therefore include the internet as an essential resource: any search would most likely start with a search on the internet. Publications that would need to be acquired in hard copy can easily be ordered through online bookshops, so the list of international book sellers has not been updated for this revised version of chapter 10.

The key works provided by Prendergast in the 1995 chapter, however, have not lost their importance. Some have been updated, and in many cases their accessibility and availability has increased as they have become available online.

A similar statement can be made for databases. While the 1995 chapter included a list of databases on plant diversity that were being developed in a variety of countries and organizations, none of them were available online at that time. Since then, the quantity and availability of databases featuring relevant data for collectors has grown considerably.
The current status and availability of the key works listed by Prendergast is provided below, illustrating how availability and accessibility has changed. Reference is also made to the other lists of publications from the earlier work.

Current status

Key works

Experts

The assertion made in 1995 (that contacting an expert on the flora and the area to be explored might provide quicker answers than consulting the literature) remains valid today. Although a literature search is much faster and easier today than it was in 1995, given the availability of the internet, the quantity of information available and to be screened has grown considerably, so targeted questions to experts can still save time – and experts are now much easier to find and contact through the internet.

The first key works listed are the 8th edition of the Index Herbariorum (Holmgren et al. 1990) and the Plant Specialist Index (Holmgren and Holmgren 1992), as these provided not only information about herbaria, but also about experts. The number of herbaria has grown considerably since 1995 (from 2,639 to nearly 4000) and so have the staff (from 7,627 to about 10,000), according to http://sciweb.nybg.org/science2/IndexHerbariorum.asp (accessed 2 February 2011).

The importance of these references has not changed, but the way of updating and presenting them to the public has kept pace with technology. There is no new hard-copy version of the Index Herbariorum but the whole Index as well as the Plant Specialist Index have been transferred to a database – “Index Herbariorum: A Global Directory of Public Herbaria and Associated Staff” – which is hosted and edited by the New York Botanical Garden and continuously updated. As the Index is fully searchable by research specialty, it also serves as a plant specialist index. The summary that Prendergast provides in 1995 about the usefulness of a search in the index and the help it can provide is still valid.

Today, experts can also be identified by visiting the websites of organizations that either work in the target area on environmental, conservation and related issues or that specialize in the species that the collector is targeting. Websites focusing on specific groups of species often contain lists of experts. Some relevant examples for collectors of wild plant are mentioned here.
The Crop Wild Relatives Global Portal (www.cropwildrelatives.org) provides names and contact details of experts as well as institutions working with crop wild relatives (CWR). Crops for the Future (www.cropsforthefuture.org/?page_id=514) has a database of the research interests of over 300 underutilized plant experts globally. Conservation organizations, as well, can provide the names of specialists or can be contacted to ask for specialists. The Species Survival Commission (SSC) of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has created targeted species list groups (www.iucn.org/about/work/programmes/species/about_ssc/specialist_groups/directory_specialist_groups/directory_sg_plants): 29 plant specialist groups exist, which cover either a country or a region (e.g., Cuba or Southern Africa) or a group of species (e.g., CWR, orchids or trees). Contact details for all specialist groups and, if existent, the respective specialist group website are currently provided on the IUCN-SSC web page. One group that is relevant to collectors of wild plants is the Crop Wild Relative Specialist Group (www.cwrsg.org/index.asp).

Checking taxonomy/species names

Prendergast cites the Index Kewensis as an authoritative resource for checking the taxonomy of species (collectors should be aware of the description of new species or changes in names of species). The importance of the Index has not changed; rather, its usefulness has increased, building on progress in information technology, creating the International Plant Name Index (IPNI) (www.ipni.org/index.html) by combining the Index Kewensis with the Gray Index (originally the Gray Herbarium Card Index) and the Australian Plant Names Index into the most comprehensive listing of plant names available today and searchable online. The Gray Index includes names for New World taxa published on or after January 1886 and has provided over 350,000 records to IPNI. The Australian Plant Names Index has contributed over 63,000 records, compiled since 1973 and including all scientific names used in the literature for Australian vascular plants. IPNI is a database of names and associated basic bibliographical details of seed plants, ferns and lycophytes. Its goal is to eliminate the need for repeated reference to primary sources for basic bibliographic information about plant names.

Other websites where species names and synonyms can be looked up have become available, and while they often provide additional information, they usually do not provide the publication place of species names as IPNI does. Some examples are provided below.

• Catalogue of Life (CoL) (www.catalogueoflife.org/annual-checklist): The goal is to create a validated checklist of the entire world's species (plants, animals, fungi and microbes) by bringing together an array of global species databases covering each of the major groups of organisms. It is jointly produced by Species2000 and the Integrated Taxonomic Information system (ITIS) of North America and is available as an annual checklist. A search in the list provides the accepted taxon name, synonyms, the classification and, if available in the source database, common names, distribution, online resources, additional data.

• GRIN is the Genetic Resources Information Network of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) (www.ars-grin.gov/cgi-bin/npgs/html/tax_search.pl?). Together with the accepted name taxonomy, it also provides synonyms, common names, distributional range, economic importance, references and links to other web resources. It covers nearly 95,000 species or infraspecies.

• TROPICOS (www.tropicos.org) is the online database of the Missouri Botanical Garden in the USA. All of the nomenclatural, bibliographic and specimen data accumulated in their electronic databases over the past 25 years are publicly available here. The system has over 1.2 million scientific names and 3.9 million specimen records.

• The African Plant Database (www.ville-ge.ch/musinfo/bd/cjb/africa/recherche.php) currently comprises 186,948 names of African plants with their nomenclatural status.

• The current version 1 of The Plant List (www.theplantlist.org) provides the accepted Latin name for most plant species covered, with links to all synonyms by which that species has been known. It also includes unresolved names for which the contributing data sources did not contain sufficient evidence to decide whether they were accepted names or synonyms. This resource has been developed through collaboration between the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and the Missouri Botanical Garden.

Other important taxonomy-related general references have become available through the internet:

• The International Code of Botanical Nomenclature (http://ibot.sav.sk/icbn/main.htm) is now available.

• The Index Nominum Genericorum (ING) (http://botany.si.edu/ing) is a compilation of generic names published for organisms covered by the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature.

• The Linnaean Plant Name Typification Project (www.nhm.ac.uk/research-curation/research/projects/linnaean-typification/databasehome.html) offers a database containing typification details for all Linnaean plant names. The place of publication is provided for each binomial, along with stated provenance, the type specimen (or illustration), a reference to where the type choice was published, and an indication of the current name of the taxon within which Linnaeus' original binomial now falls (binomial and family names).

• “Vascular Plant Families and Genera”, compiled by R. K. Brummitt and published by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, in 1992, is now available as an online database: http://data.kew.org/vpfg1992/vascplnt.html.

Two reference books cited by Prendergast that still need to be consulted as books are Cronquist‟s “The Evolution and Classification of Flowering Plants” and Mabberley‟s “The Plant-book”.

Digitized botanical literature

The Kew record of taxonomic literature, later the Kew Record (http://kbd.kew.org/kbd/searchpage.do), has also become searchable online and is no longer published as hard copy. Kew‟s bibliographic database on economic botany and plant micromorphology can be searched through the same interface. Individual countries can easily be scanned for botanical publications, which can help to identify relevant books and journal articles for specific regions. For more details about the importance and use of this resource, please refer to the 1995 edition of this chapter.

There are other online sources of digitized botanical literature, such as the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) (www.biodiversitylibrary.org), which is a consortium of 12 natural history and botanical libraries. And single botanic gardens and herbaria have started to provide online access to their resources. Examples are the Missouri Botanic Garden‟s Botanicus (www.botanicus.org) or the Real Jardín Botánico in Madrid, Spain (http://bibdigital.rjb.csic.es/ing/index.php).

Another key publication “Plants in Danger: What Do We Know?” (Davis et al. 1986) covers all countries of the world and is now available in full text online (www.archive.org/stream/plantsindangerwh86davi/plantsindangerwh86davi_djvu.txt).

Floras

An updated edition of Frodin‟s “Guide to Standard Floras of the World”, which is mentioned in the 1995 edition of the Technical Guidelines as an indispensable source, was published in June 2001 and is available online (http://assets.cambridge.org/97805217/90772/sample/9780521790772ws.pdf). It is considered the standard listing of known Floras and ongoing Flora projects, with an annotated, geographical, systematic bibliography of the principal Floras, as well as enumerations, checklists and chronological atlases of different areas.

The number of Floras available online is increasing, and they are often more than a simple checklist and include identification keys. Many Floras, catalogues and checklists of plant species are based on a geographic region or a species group (mostly family). However, they provide varying levels of detail, from simply the nomenclature, through nomenclature and distribution to the detailed description usually contained in a Flora. Photo guides to plants are also becoming available online, such as the photo guide to West African plants (www.westafricanplants.senckenberg.de/root/index.php).

The TROPICOS database provides a series of 28 projects (www.tropicos.org/ProjectList.aspx) where links are provided to single online checklists, catalogues and Floras (including keys for identification) of several plant families and countries or regions. Some of them are integrated in the website of eFloras (www.eFloras.org), which provides access to 10 floras and 4 checklists (www.efloras.org). See Brach and Song (2006) for a description.

Table 10.1 contains checklists and Floras for specific countries or regions, and table 10.2 lists Floras for specific groups of plants. They have either been extracted from the websites listed above or found through internet searches. The list also contains those floras listed by Prendergast that have become available online since the publication of this chapter in 1995. These lists are not intended to be complete and it is expected that more Floras will become available online in the future.

Table 10.1: Checklists and Floras Available Online for Specific Countries or Regions

 Ecological key works

The two outstanding works mentioned by Prendergast in this section in the original chapter have neither been updated nor revised, but they are still valid as references. These are Takhtajan (1986) “Floristic Regions of the World” and White (1983) “The Vegetation of Africa”.

The list of the 35 floristic regions provided by Takhtajan and their subdivisions into a total of 152 floristic provinces can be viewed on Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phytochorion). Some of the provinces already have links to more detailed descriptions.

White‟s “Vegetation of Africa” was written to accompany the UNESCO vegetation map of Africa. A very extensive checklist of online vegetation and plant distribution maps (http://cluster3.lib.berkeley.edu/EART/vegmaps.html), developed by the library of the University of California, Berkeley, can be found online.

Table 10.2: Checklists and Floras Available Online for Specific Plant Groups

Centres of plant diversity, protected areas and conservation status

All volumes of the “Centres of Plant Diversity” have now been published, and the information for the Americas is available online (http://botany.si.edu/projects/cpd/about_project.htm).

There are many different types of protected, designated and recognized areas of biodiversity, and there are many varied terms used to refer to them. The A to Z Areas of Biodiversity Importance (www.biodiversitya-z.org) provides clear, concise and relevant information about each type of area.

The most comprehensive dataset on protected areas is provided through the Word Database of Protected Areas (WDPA) (www.wdpa.org).

The “World Plant Conservation Bibliography”, published in 1990 by the World Conservation Monitoring Centre (WCMC) and the Royal Botanic Garden, Kew, is available online (www.archive.org/details/worldplantconser90wcmc). Many more publications have become available since the publication of that bibliography, but no similar effort has been made to compile more recent publications. Here again, a search on the internet or in targeted bibliographic databases (see chapter 13) is the best start to obtaining literature concerning conservation issues and the status of a target species or region.

The threat status of a species might be verified through a search in the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) red list of threatened species (www.iucnredlist.org).

Today there are global databases that provide data to help understand and map the distribution and ex situ conservation status of target species. Two examples are the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) data portal (http://data.gbif.org/welcome.htm;jsessionid=5D1EA90E4AC94B68C5A78D24C326A35E) and GENESYS (www.genesys-pgr.org).

Ecological works, botanic bibliographies and fruit & seed identification

The ecological works listed in the 1995 version of this chapter are still valid references and starting points. Additional ecological works might have become available since then and others might have been updated. The reader can easily verify this through an internet search. Online availability can also be quickly verified through a simple internet search for the title of the publication.

Because bibliographies get outdated much more quickly than ecological works, a specific search will be necessary to get an overview of publications published during the past 20 years. However, the bibliographies cited in the 1995 version of this chapter provide references to important baseline publications and can serve as a way to understand how thoroughly a region has been studied.

Seed identification aids are becoming available online. The first two hits when searching for seed identification are “Seed Identification and How to Identify Seeds” (www.seedimages.com/seed-identification/seed-identification.html), from Colorado State University, and the Arable Seed Identification System (ASIS) (http://asis.scri.ac.uk) developed by the Scottish Crop Research Institute.

Conclusions

The advent of the internet has completely changed the ways and possibilities of obtaining information, and it has become the first choice for searching for information and data. The fact that many of the botanical key works have become online resources that are freely available for consultation and search confirms their continued relevance and illustrates the importance of the internet as a means to publish and search for data.

The lists of online resources provided in this update are by no means comprehensive, as new resources are becoming available every day. Nearly every website has a page with relevant and related links to other websites, which can guide the user to additional resources.

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References and further reading

Brach AR, Song H. 2006. eFloras: New directions for online floras exemplified by the Flora of China Project. Taxon 55(1):188–192.

Brummitt RK. 1992. Vascular Plant Families and Genera. The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, UK. Available online (accessed 25 September 2011): http://data.kew.org/vpfg1992/vascplnt.html.

Cronquist A. 1988. The Evolution and Classification of Flowering Plants. New York Botanical Garden, New York.

Davis SD, Droop SJM, Gregerson P, Henson L, Leon CJ, Villa-Lobos JL, Synge H, Zantovska JA. 1986. Plants in Danger: What Do We Know? International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, Gland, Switzerland. Available online (accessed 26 July 2011): www.archive.org/stream/plantsindangerwh86davi/plantsindangerwh86davi_djvu.txt.

Frodin DG. 2001. Standard Floras of the World. 2nd edition. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK. Available online (accessed 23 May 2011): http://assets.cambridge.org/97805217/90772/sample/9780521790772ws.pdf.

Holmgren PK, Holmgren NH. 1992. Plant specialists index. Regnum Vegetabile 124:1–394.

Holmgren NH, Holmgren PK, Barnett LC (eds). 1990. Index Herbariorum. New York Botanical Garden, New York.

Mabberley DJ. 1989. The Plant-Book: A Portable Dictionary of the Higher Plants. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK.

Takhtajan A. 1986. Floristic Regions of the World. (Translated by TJ Crovello). California University Press, Berkeley.

Thiers, B. [continuously updated]. Index Herbariorum. New York Botanical Garden's Virtual Herbarium. http://sweetgum.nybg.org/ih

White F. 1983. The Vegetation of Africa: A Descriptive Memoir to Accompany the UNESCO/AETFATIUNSO Vegetation Map of Africa. UNESCO, Paris.

Internet resources

A to Z Areas of Biodiversity Importance: www.biodiversitya-z.org

African Plant Database: www.ville-ge.ch/musinfo/bd/cjb/africa/recherche.php

Arable Seed Identification System (ASIS): http://asis.scri.ac.uk

Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL): www.biodiversitylibrary.org

Catalogue of Life (CoL): www.catalogueoflife.org/annual-checklist

Centres of Plant Diversity, the Americas: http://botany.si.edu/projects/cpd/about_project.htm

Checklist of Online Vegetation and Plant Distribution Maps: http://cluster3.lib.berkeley.edu/EART/vegmaps.html

Crop Wild Relatives Global Portal: www.cropwildrelatives.org

Crop Wild Relative Specialist Group: http://www.cwrsg.org/index.asp

Crops for the Future: www.cropsforthefuture.org/?page_id=514

eFloras: www.eFloras.org

GENESYS: www.genesys-pgr.org

Genetic Resources Information Network (GRIN) of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA): www.ars-grin.gov/cgi-bin/npgs/html/tax_search.pl?

Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF): http://data.gbif.org/welcome.htm;jsessionid=5D1EA90E4AC94B68C5A78D24C326A35E

Index Herbariorum (a global directory of public herbaria and associated staff): http://sciweb.nybg.org/science2/IndexHerbariorum.asp

Index Nominum Genericorum (ING): http://botany.si.edu/ing

International Code of Botanical Nomenclature: http://ibot.sav.sk/icbn/main.htm

International Plant Name Index (IPNI): www.ipni.org/index.html

IUCN Red List of Threatened Species: www.iucnredlist.org

Kew Record: http://kbd.kew.org/kbd/searchpage.do

Linnaean Plant Name Typification Project: www.nhm.ac.uk/research-curation/research/projects/linnaean-typification/databasehome.html

Photo guide to West African plants: www.westafricanplants.senckenberg.de/root/index.php

Real Jardín Botánico: http://bibdigital.rjb.csic.es/ing/index.php

Seed Identification and How to Identify Seeds: www.seedimages.com/seed-identification/seed-identification.html

Target species list groups of the Species Survival Commission (SSC) of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN): www.iucn.org/about/work/programmes/species/about_ssc/specialist_groups/directory_specialist_groups/directory_sg_plants

The Plant List: www.theplantlist.org

TROPICOS, online database of the Missouri Botanical Garden: www.tropicos.org

Vascular Plant Families and Genera (compiled by RK Brummitt, published by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, 1992): http://data.kew.org/vpfg1992/vascplnt.html

World Plant Conservation Bibliography: www.archive.org/details/worldplantconser90wcmc

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Chapter 8: Sources of information on existing germplasm collections

E. Bettencourt
Genetic Resources, Ecophysiology and Plant Breeding Unit, Instituto Nacional de Recursos Biológicos, I.P. (INRB, I.P.),
Instituto Nacional de Investigação Agrária (INIA), Oeiras, Portugal. (currently on leave of absence)
E-mail: eliseu.bettencourt(at)gmail.com

This chapter is a synthesis of new knowledge, procedures, best practices and references for collecting plant diversity since the publication of the 1995 volume Collecting Plant Diversity; Technical Guidelines, edited by Luigi Guarino, V. Ramanatha Rao and Robert Reid, and published by CAB International on behalf of the International Plant Genetic Resources Institute (IPGRI) (now Bioversity International), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the World Conservation Union (IUCN) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). The original text for Chapter 8: Sources of Information on Existing Germplasm Collections, authored by M. C. Perry and E. Bettencourt, has been made available online courtesy of CABI. The 2011 update of the Technical Guidelines, edited by L. Guarino, V. Ramanatha Rao and E. Goldberg, has been made available courtesy of Bioversity International.

Please send any comments on this chapter using the Comments feature at the bottom of this page. If you wish to contribute new content or references on the subject please do so here.

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	Bits and pieces from different sources combine to create reliable sources of information. (Photos: E. Bettencourt; except photo lower left corner: F. Rocha/BPGV, Portugal.)

Abstract

This update of chapter 8 of the Technical Guidelines, on sources of information on existing germplasm collections, looks at new developments in information technology and available data, supplementing the information in the original chapter. It takes into account two types of data sources: data maintained in electronic storage-and-retrieval systems at the institutional, national, subregional, regional and global level; and data made available in the specialized scientific literature. This review and update does not pretend to be exhaustive but, rather, to identify examples that will give users an idea of the situation regarding information on plant genetic resources, from which they can extrapolate to identify and explore other ways of finding, identifying, analysing and making use of the information available.

Introduction

Information technology is a rapidly evolving field where news of technological innovations, new tools and breakthroughs has a permanent place in the headlines. Even if we don’t realise it, information technology is, for better or for worse, inextricably associated to our day-to-day life. For those who deal with large amounts of data and have the need to store, retrieve, analyse and use information, information technology is a blessing that cannot be praised highly enough.

The planning, organization and carrying out of missions for collecting germplasm started, in a scientific manner, in the 1920s. These missions have been based on an understanding of the importance of biodiversity in the production of more and better foods – and more recently, a realization of the important role that biodiversity plays in helping to address the challenges of climate change and constantly evolving pests and diseases, by providing a source of new materials and knowledge.

The total number of germplasm accessions maintained in ex situ collections worldwide is estimated as 7.4 million, but in spite of this apparently vast genepool, it is estimated that fewer than 30% (1.9 to 2.2 million) of this total are unique accessions (FAO 2010). The need for further diversity is a reality, and collecting must continue in order to fill in the diversity gap in existing germplasm collections.

Since the 1995 publication of these Technical Guidelines, a great deal of germplasm has been collected: approximately 240,000 new accessions (FAO 2010). And new technologies for recording, storing, managing and retrieving data have become available.

This update of the chapter on sources of information on existing germplasm collections attempts to synthesize these new developments and to supplement the information in the original chapter.

Current status

Despite data being available in greater quantity and quality than ever before, it is not always recorded and maintained in a format that makes it easily, readily and universally available. However, “if there's a will, there's a way”, and provided that the data exists, there will be always a way to make the most of it.

In this update, two types of sources are considered:
1. data maintained in electronic storage-and-retrieval systems at the institutional, national, subregional, regional and global level
2. data made available in the scientific literature

Presently, many institutions maintaining germplasm collections have the information concerning their holdings online. If one wants to collate information about a particular geographical area or a specific species, it may be worth starting with a search of the holdings of either genebanks located in the target region or genebanks for which the target species is the focus of their research.

Sources of information at the accession/sample/species level

At the genebank level

The following genebanks have information on their holdings online:

• Centre for Genetic Resources, Plant Genetic Resources (CGN-PGR), the Netherlands (www.cgn.wur.nl/UK/CGN+Plant+Genetic+Resources)

• Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research (IPK), Germany (www.ipk-gatersleben.de/Internet)

• Centro de Recursos Fitogenéticos (C.R.F.), Spain (wwwx.inia.es/webcrf/CRFing/PaginaPrincipal.asp)

• N. I. Vavilov All-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Plant Industry (VIR), Russian Federation (www.vir.nw.ru/data/dbf.htm)

• Recursos Genéticos e Biotecnologia (EMBRAPA), Brazil (www.cenargen.embrapa.br)

• ISOPlexis, Universidade da Madeira, Portugal (http://www3.uma.pt/isoplexis/index_eng.html)

• Kew's Millennium Seed Bank, Wakehurst Place, UK (http://data.kew.org/sid/about.html)

The information systems of these genebanks allow the user to browse, search and view information on their germplasm holdings. Many offer the possibility to download the search results, and some include a function for requesting germplasm samples.

At the national level

Many countries have established national inventories on plant genetic resources that are freely and widely available online. This enables participating countries to contribute to their biodiversity and conservation obligations at the national level and to meet the requirements of international agreements such as the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), the Global Plan of Action for the Conservation and Sustainable Utilization of Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (GPA), the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (“the Treaty”) and the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF).

• Australian Plant Genetic Resource Information Service (AusPGRIS) (www2.dpi.qld.gov.au/extra/asp/auspgris)

• National Inventory of Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, Austria (www.genbank.at)

• Genetic Resources Institute of the National Academy of Sciences, Azerbaijan (www.cac-biodiversity.org/aze/aze_instgen.htm)

• Canadian Plant Germplasm System (PGRC) (http://pgrc3.agr.gc.ca/about-propos_e.html)

• Plant Genetic Resources Documentation (EVIGEZ), Czech Republic (http://genbank.vurv.cz/genetic/resources)

• Estonia (www.sordiaretus.ee)

• Bureau des Ressources Génétiques (BRG), France (www.brg.prd.fr/index.php)

• Informationssystem Genetische Ressourcen (GENRES), Germany (www.genres.de/pgrdeu)

• Japan National Institute of Agrobiological Sciences (NIAS) Genebank (www.gene.affrc.go.jp/databases_en.php)

• Lithuanian Institute of Agriculture (www.lzi.lt)

• Centre for Genetic Resources, Plant Genetic Resources (CGN-PGR), the Netherlands (www.cgn.wur.nl/UK/CGN+Plant+Genetic+Resources)

• Nordic Countries (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden) (www.nordgen.org/ngb)

• Plant Breeding and Acclimatization Institute (IHAR), Poland (www.ihar.edu.pl/gene_bank)

• N. I. Vavilov All-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Plant Industry (VIR) (www.vir.nw.ru/data/dbf.htm)

• Agricultural Institute of Slovenia (www.kis.si/pls/kis/!kis.web)

• Centro de Recursos Fitogenéticos (CRF), Spain (wwwx.inia.es/webcrf/CRFing/PaginaPrincipal.asp)

• USDA Agricultural Research Service, National Genetic Resources Program (NGRP), USA (www.ars-grin.gov)

These national inventories collate information from different data sources (germplasm collections) and constitute a network of centres and people dedicated to conserving the genetic diversity of crop plants and their wild relatives.

At the regional/subregional level

At the regional and subregional level, there are initiatives to collate and make available data on national holdings. These initiatives are normally undertaken to assist countries in meeting their national, regional and global commitments regarding documentation and information on their plant genetic resources.

An example of such a regional initiative is EURISCO (http://eurisco.ecpgr.org/home_page/home.php), a web-based catalogue that provides information about ex situ plant germplasm collections maintained in Europe. The EURISCO catalogue contains passport data on more than 1 million accessions of crop diversity from 41 countries, representing 5,396 genera and 35,235 species (genus-species combinations including synonyms and spelling variants). EURISCO is hosted at and maintained by Bioversity International on behalf of the Secretariat of the European Cooperative Programme for Plant Genetic Resources (ECPGR).

ECPGR also maintains a series of European central crop databases established through the initiative of individual institutes and of ECPGR working groups. The ECPGR Central Crops Databases (ECCDBs) (www.ecpgr.cgiar.org/germplasm_databases/list_of_germplasm_databases/crop_databases.html#c5509) include the following:

• Cereals: Avena, Barley, Maize, Secale, Triticale, Wheat

• Forages: Dactylis, Festuca, Lolium, Phleum, Poa, Medicago (annual and perennial), Minor Forage Grasses (Agropyron, Agrostis, Alopecurus, Arrhenatherum, Bromus, Phalaris, Trisetum), Minor Forage Legumes (Astragalus, Anthyllis, Coronilla, Desmodium, Hedysarum, Lotus, Melilotus, Onobrychis, Ornithopus, Physanthyllis, Tetragonolobus, Vicia), Trifolium spp., Trifolium subterraneum, Vigna

• Oil and Protein Crops: Arachis, Cicer, Glycine, Lathyrus, Lens, Lupinus, Phaseolus, Pisum, Vicia faba, Vigna

• Sugar, Starch and Fibre Crops: Hemp, Beta, Flax, Potato (cultivated), Potato (wild bearing tubers)

• Temperate Fruits: Malus, Prunus, Pyrus, Ribes/Rubus, Vitis, Minor Fruit Trees

• Vegetables: Allium, Brassica, Chicory, Cucurbits, Cyphomandra, Physalis, Eggplant, Lactuca, Beta, Lettuce, Minor Leafy Vegetables, Pepino, Pepper, Potato (cultivated and wild), Spinach, Tomato, Umbellifer

The databases hold passport data and, to varying degrees, characterization and primary evaluation data of the major collections of the respective crops in Europe.

The Eastern Africa Plant Genetic Resources Network (EAPGREN) is a regional project of the national agricultural research systems of Burundi, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Rwanda, Sudan and Uganda, aimed at strengthening collaboration, networking and linkages between the conservation and utilization of plant genetic resources at both the national and subregional level.

The objective of the EAPGREN data portal (www.nordgen.org/portal/index.php?scope=eapgren&PHPSESSID=4pa906im0ghl5ll2il8u80l5d1) is to publish passport data of all the documented accessions in the EAPGREN countries. This information is published according to the List of Multi-crop Passport Descriptors (MCPD). The data set contains 3,932 records searchable through a simple search form.

An example of a subregional network can be illustrated by the South East European Development Network on Plant Genetic Resources (SEEDNet) (www.seednet.nu), a network of 13 countries of the Balkan region. The available data (199,325 records) can be searched for accessions either originating or stored in the SEEDNet region.

There are a number of regional networks for plant genetic resources in all continents. Although they do not have a centralized online system with information about the participants’ germplasm holdings, they are an important entry point for finding information. Some examples are given below.

The Mesoamerican Plant Genetic Resources Network (REMERFI), was established in the early 1990s by seven Mesoamerican countries (Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua and Panama), aiming at strengthening the national programmes for plant genetic resources of Mesoamerican countries through collaborative research and training. The network serves as a platform for countries to address key issues on the conservation and use of their plant genetic resources at the regional level. Information can be sought by contacting the regional coordinator at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. (IPGRI 2001).

The Southern African Development Community (SADC) countries (Angola, Botswana, Democratic Republic of Congo, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Seychelles, South Africa, Swaziland, United Republic of Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe) have pooled their resources and established the SADC Plant Genetic Resources Centre (SPGRC) (www.sadc.int/fanr/agricresearch/spgrc/index.php) in Lusaka, Zambia, where the base collection for long-term storage is maintained and activities for the region are coordinated. The individual national plant genetic resources centres (NPGRCs) maintain active collections for short-term storage for immediate use in crop improvement.

The genebank information for the SADC Plant Genetic Resources Network has been standardized through the development of the SPGRC Documentation and Information System (SDIS) at SPGRC and installed at all the NPGRCs. In addition, an assessment of existing collections that are held by plant breeders and in genebanks in the various countries has been carried out, together with herbaria surveys of important indigenous crops and their wild relatives. However, the information is not centralized and is maintained and managed by each of the individual member countries.

The Genetic Resources Network for West and Central Africa (GRENEWECA) was created in 1998 and comprises the national programmes for the genetic resources of West and Central Africa, regional or international institutions of research, and nongovernmental organizations in the subregion. One of the main duties of the network is to “facilitate the circulation and exchange of information within as well as among member countries and those outside the network”. More information can be obtained from the network coordinator: R. S. Vodouhe, Bioversity International (This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.).

ECPGR maintains a list of PGR regional networks, which can be consulted and accessed through the following link: (www.ecpgr.cgiar.org/networks/inter_regional_coop/pgr_regional_nw_coordinators.html).

At the global level

As its germplasm information-exchange network, the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) and its partners implemented the System-wide Information Network for Genetic Resources (SINGER) (http://singer.cgiar.org), which provides easy access to information about the diversity maintained by SINGER members, covering more than half a million accessions of crops and wild relatives.

As a result of the collaboration between Bioversity International on behalf of the CGIAR, the Global Crop Diversity Trust and the Secretariat of the Treaty, a global portal to information about plant genetic resources has been established, bringing together data from SINGER, EURISCO and the US Germplasm Resources Information Network (GRIN). The portal, GENESYS (www.genesys-pgr.org), is a gateway through which germplasm accessions from genebanks around the world can be found and ordered directly through the web interface. In addition to passport data, the system provides access to characterization and evaluation data as well as to environmental information associated with the accessions’ collecting sites.

From 1974 to 2003, Bioversity International (under its previous names of IBPGR and IPGRI) supported germplasm collecting missions around the world. The IBPGR/IPGRI Supported Missions Database (http://singer.cgiar.org/index.jsp?page=coll-sample-data) gives access, at a sample level, to passport data for about 130,000 samples, as well as access to 27,000 original reports, collecting forms and other documents in PDF format.

The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) (http://data.gbif.org/welcome.htm;jsessionid=37820DBEE26CAA62FAB10ADD1EE5B67D) is focused on making biodiversity data available online for scientific research, conservation and sustainable development. Enabling access to 293,485,946 data records, the GBIF information infrastructure is an internet-based index of a globally distributed network of interoperable databases that contain primary biodiversity data: information on museum specimens, field observations of plants and animals in nature, and results from experiments. The search interface also supports searches about the occurrence of species at particular times and places.

Sources of information at a metadata level

The FAO World Information and Early Warning System on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (WIEWS) (http://apps3.fao.org/wiews/wiews.jsp) is both a dynamic worldwide mechanism to foster information exchange and an instrument for the periodic assessment of the state of the world's plant genetic resources for food and agriculture.

WIEWS maintains information on country profiles, including the structure of 190 national programmes and activities for plant genetic resources, as well as information on worldwide ex situ collections, containing summary records (metadata) of germplasm holdings on 7,184,418 accessions of 53,109 species, reported by more than 1,500 national, regional or international genebanks.

There are over 2,500 botanic gardens worldwide, maintaining 80,000 plant species, representing nearly one-third of all known plant species (FAO 2010). Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI) was established in 1987 as a small secretariat under the auspices of the World Conservation Union (IUCN). Today, BGCI is an international organization with over 700 members and other partners from 118 countries worldwide and has the mission “to ensure the world-wide conservation of threatened plants, the continued existence of which are intrinsically linked to global issues including poverty, human well-being and climate change”. BGCI maintains a database, PlantSearch (www.bgci.org/plant_search.php), which can locate rare and threatened plant species in cultivation around the world. The database, presently including over 575,000 records, is compiled from lists of living collections submitted to BGCI by the world's botanic gardens. It also maintains a database, GardenSearch (www.bgci.org/garden_search.php), with over 2,826 records, that can find a botanic garden (member or not) anywhere in the world.

Globally, there are approximately 3,400 herbaria with approximately 10,000 associated curators and biodiversity specialists. These herbaria, collectively, maintain an estimated 350,000,000 specimens. The Index Herbariorum, a Global Directory of Public Herbaria and Associated Staff (http://sciweb.nybg.org/science2/IndexHerbariorum.asp), keeps records for each herbarium on street and web address, number and type of specimens and history as well as names, contact information and areas of expertise of associated staff.

Sources of information in the scientific literature

Although not specifically addressing plant genetic resources, there are other tools that can help to unearth data from web-available sources.

Zanran (www.zanran.com) is a good example of such tools. Zanran is a search engine that unearths data in charts, graphs and tables. It indexes and maps the numerical content on the web, finding “semi-structured” data, which could be anything from a graph in a PDF report, a table in an Excel spreadsheet or a bar chart shown as an image on an HTML page. In the near future, it will also process PowerPoint and Word documents. The system examines millions of images and determines whether they are a graph, chart or table and if they have numerical content.

A test search made using the indicator “germplasm” yielded 1,753 matching results. Hovering the mouse over the PDF icon on the left column opens a document-preview window, facilitating the identification and selection of desired documents.

The test search results varied from data on germplasm characterization and germplasm duplication to germplasm distribution and the holdings of germplasm collections.

Besides source data housed in electronic storage and retrieval systems, there are enormous amounts of valuable data made available in the scientific literature as well as through “grey literature” like the reports of collecting missions and field notebooks. In spite of its value and importance, such information is not in a format that makes it easily, readily and universally available. The need for recording and maintaining data in a way that is easily, readily and universally available has prompted initiatives to digitalize and make available original collecting reports.

In addition, many accounts of germplasm collecting trips have been published in specialized journals like the FAO/Bioversity International Plant Genetic Resources Newsletter. An index of articles from issues 25 to 100 of the Newsletter and from issues 1 to 24 of the FAO Plant Introduction Newsletter (the previous title of the publication) has been published, facilitating the search and selection of information, although they are not available online at this time.

ECPGR publishes the Newsletter for Europe (until recently on hard copy and now in PDF format) and Bioversity International publishes a series of regional or network-related newsletters, which, in many issues, carry articles and notices on the results of germplasm collecting missions.

Bioversity’s website (www.bioversityinternational.org), under the label “publications”, offers a search facility that provides access to a number of these newsletters in PDF format.

Other sources of information

As pointed out by Lister (2011), natural history collections comprise not only the products of opportunistic collecting but are also repositories of major surveys, particularly in the major national museums and institutions. Coupled with the availability of accurate provenance data on the material, they can provide a rich source of data.

Museum specimen labels and registers ideally indicate the place and date of collection. However, even when such information is available, considerable work may be required to make it accessible for research, for example, by georeferencing obscure place names and entering all records onto an electronic database.

Although data on material held in natural history collections is sometimes not in a format that is easily, readily and universally accessible, this information represents an invaluable source of data and can prove to be extremely useful in collating information on past plant surveying and collecting as well as being an important repository of environmental and ecological information.

University museums contain some of the richest and most extraordinary collections in the world, and historic collections provide historical snapshots of past biodiversity. They are a rich source of material for studies in phylogenetics, population dynamics and conservation biology (MacDonald and Ashby 2011). Again, in many cases, the existing data may not be in a readily usable format but, nevertheless, it is of great importance and worth consulting and analysing.

Future challenges/needs/gaps

It is estimated that a considerable amount of information still lies on genebank shelves in the form of field notebooks, reports of collecting missions and collectors’ notes. It is certainly a challenge but also necessary to have that valuable data analysed and recorded in a way that facilitates access to it, thus promoting the use of the germplasm with which this information is associated.

The existing and available information systems on plant genetic resources are priceless sources of information, although data on characterization and evaluation tend to be poor or absent. Closing this gap by adding this information, thus fostering the use of germplasm, would represent a giant step towards addressing the threats these resources and agriculture are facing, from changes in climate and constantly evolving pests and diseases.

Conclusions

During the time since the publication of the Technical Guidelines in 1995, the dissemination of information through the internet has increased tremendously in both quantity and quality.

Today, there is more information available than ever before and, despite the fact that it is not always recorded and maintained in a format that makes it easily, readily and universally available, the user has access to an enormous number of data sources.

This review and update of the chapter 8, on sources of information on existing germplasm collections, does not pretend to be exhaustive but, rather, to identify examples that can give the user an idea of the actual situation in the field of information on plant genetic resources.

The user will be able to extrapolate from these examples, to go on to identify and explore other ways of finding, identifying, analysing and making use of information on past germplasm collecting missions and to build on this information in the planning and implementation of future explorations and collecting missions.

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References and further reading

FAO. 1996. Global Plan of Action for the Conservation and Sustainable Utilization of Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome. Available online (accessed 29 September 2011): www.globalplanofaction.org/servlet/CDSServlet?status=ND1ncGEmNj1lbiYzMz0qJjM3PWtvcw~~.

FAO. 2010. The Second Report on The State of the World’s Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Rome. Available online (accessed 29 September 2011): www.fao.org/docrep/013/i1500e/i1500e.pdf.

IPGRI. 2001. REMERFI: A platform to use agrobiodiversity in Mesoamerica. Newsletter for the Americas 7(1):6–7.

Lister AM, et al. 2011. Natural history collections as sources of long-term datasets. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 26(4): 153–154.

MacDonald S, Ashby J. 2011. Campus treasures. Nature 471:164–165.

Sharrock SL. 2011. The biodiversity benefits of botanic gardens. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 26(9):433.

Internet resources

Agricultural Institute of Slovenia: www.kis.si/pls/kis/!kis.web

Australian Plant Genetic Resource Information Service (AusPGRIS): www2.dpi.qld.gov.au/extra/asp/auspgris

Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI), GardenSearch: www.bgci.org/garden_search.php

Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI), PlantSearch: www.bgci.org/plant_search.php

Bureau des Ressources Génétiques (BRG), France: www.brg.prd.fr/index.php

Canadian Plant Germplasm System (PGRC): http://pgrc3.agr.gc.ca/about-propos_e.html

Centre for Genetic Resources, Plant Genetic Resources (CGN-PGR), the Netherlands: www.cgn.wur.nl/UK/CGN+Plant+Genetic+Resources

Centro de Recursos Fitogenéticos (C.R.F.), Spain: wwwx.inia.es/webcrf/CRFing/PaginaPrincipal.asp

CGIAR System-wide Information Network for Genetic Resources (SINGER): http://singer.cgiar.org

EAPGREN data portal: www.nordgen.org/portal/index.php?scope=eapgren&PHPSESSID=4pa906im0ghl5ll2il8u80l5d1

ECPGR Central Crops Databases (ECCDBs): www.ecpgr.cgiar.org/germplasm_databases/list_of_germplasm_databases/crop_databases.html#c5509

ECPGR list of PGR regional networks: www.ecpgr.cgiar.org/networks/inter_regional_coop/pgr_regional_nw_coordinators.html

Estonia: www.sordiaretus.ee

EURISCO: http://eurisco.ecpgr.org/home_page/home.php

FAO World Information and Early Warning System on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture (WIEWS): http://apps3.fao.org/wiews/wiews.jsp

GENESYS: www.genesys-pgr.org

Genetic Resources Institute of the National Academy of Sciences, Azerbaijan: www.cac-biodiversity.org/aze/aze_instgen.htm

Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF): http://data.gbif.org/welcome.htm;jsessionid=37820DBEE26CAA62FAB10ADD1EE5B67D

IBPGR/IPGRI Supported Missions Database: http://singer.cgiar.org/index.jsp?page=coll-sample-data

Index Herbariorum, a Global Directory of Public Herbaria and Associated Staff: http://sciweb.nybg.org/science2/IndexHerbariorum.asp

Informationssystem Genetische Ressourcen (GENRES), Germany: www.genres.de/pgrdeu

ISOPlexis, Universidade da Madeira, Portugal: http://www3.uma.pt/isoplexis/index_eng.html

Japan National Institute of Agrobiological Sciences (NIAS) Genebank: www.gene.affrc.go.jp/databases_en.php

Kew's Millennium Seed Bank, Wakehurst Place, UK: http://data.kew.org/sid/about.html

Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research (IPK), Germany: www.ipk-gatersleben.de/Internet

Lithuanian Institute of Agriculture: www.lzi.lt

N. I. Vavilov All-Russian Scientific Research Institute of Plant Industry (VIR), Russian Federation: www.vir.nw.ru/data/dbf.htm

National Genetic Resources Program (NGRP), USA: www.ars-grin.gov

National Inventory of Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, Austria: www.genbank.at

Nordic Countries (Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden): www.nordgen.org/ngb

Plant Breeding and Acclimatization Institute (IHAR), Poland: www.ihar.edu.pl/gene_bank

Plant Genetic Resources Documentation (EVIGEZ), Czech Republic: http://genbank.vurv.cz/genetic/resources

Recursos Genéticos e Biotecnologia (EMBRAPA), Brazil: www.cenargen.embrapa.br

SADC Plant Genetic Resources Centre (SPGRC): www.sadc.int/fanr/agricresearch/spgrc/index.php

South East European Development Network on Plant Genetic Resources (SEEDNet): www.seednet.nu

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Chapter 19: Collecting and recording data in the field: media for data recording

M. Way
Millennium Seed Bank Partnership
Royal Botanic Gardens Kew Wakehurst Place, Ardingly, UK
E-mail: m.way(at)kew.org

This chapter is a synthesis of new knowledge, procedures, best practices and references for collecting plant diversity since the publication of the 1995 volume Collecting Plant Diversity; Technical Guidelines, edited by Luigi Guarino, V. Ramanatha Rao and Robert Reid, and published by CAB International on behalf of the International Plant Genetic Resources Institute (IPGRI) (now Bioversity International), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the World Conservation Union (IUCN) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). The original text for Chapter 19: Gathering and Recording Data in the Field, authored by H. Moss and L. Guarino, has been made available online courtesy of CABI. The 2011 update of the Technical Guidelines, edited by L. Guarino, V. Ramanatha Rao and E. Goldberg, has been made available courtesy of Bioversity International.

Please send any comments on this chapter using the Comments feature at the bottom of this page. If you wish to contribute new content or references on the subject please do so here.

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References for this chapter

Internet resources for this chapter

	Michael Way, of Kew, collecting Ephedra andina for the Millennium Seed Bank. . (Photo: J. Drori/Board of Trustees, RBG Kew.)

Abstract

While the medium for data recording in the field remains paper forms and notebooks for many genetic resource conservation programmes, the direct capture of geolocation, image and associated data in digital form is increasingly practiced. Portable computers have proven utility for recording field data. They can be preloaded with standardized descriptor lists for a project or mission, enabling swift output of data for checking and uploading to the main project database. This allows for greater standardization, accuracy and completeness of data, as well as potential time savings.

Current status

For many genetic resource conservation programmes, the medium for data recording in the field remains paper forms and notebooks because of their inherent reliability and flexibility, but the direct capture of geolocation, images and associated data in digital form is increasingly practiced worldwide.

Portable computers

Portable computers now have proven utility for recording field data, and when used to full potential, they can be preloaded with standardized descriptor lists for a project or mission, enabling swift output of data for checking and uploading to the main project database. This allows for greater standardization, accuracy and completeness of data, as well as potential time savings.

Field laptops

Field laptops (specified for their resilience in field conditions) have been useful for data capture in the United States Seeds of Success programme (Byrne and Gordon 2009) when preloaded with collectors’ software developed by BG-BASE, Inc. but the sensitivity of laptops to dust and moisture, together with limited battery life, has limited their use for prolonged fieldwork.

Hand-held computers

More promising has been the use of compact hand-held computers (notably the Portable Data Assistant, PDA). The team from the Embrapa-Cenargen Herbarium in Brazil have used the Newton screen with Elcen software to facilitate the collection and transfer of standardized data from multiple herbarium specimens at a single location (Cavalcanti et al. 1998).

In projects compiling data for the United Kingdom Overseas Territories Species and Specimens Database (http://dps.plants.ox.ac.uk/bol/UKOT) a more comprehensive database with extensive dictionaries for vegetation type, threat and habitat characteristics has been loaded into PDAs that include an integrated global positioning system (GPS). In bad weather these devices have been used within protective covers, but the speed of development of PDAs will bring increasingly robust and powerful tools into the market, which can be of practical use for germplasm collecting teams. The most significant obstacle to wider use (the limited battery life of this equipment) can be overcome either by carrying flexible photovoltaic panels that can be deployed at the collection site or by fitting solar panels to the roof of the expedition vehicle for periodic recharging of equipment batteries. Advice on the options available is set out in chapter 13 of the Field Techniques Manual of the Royal Geographical Society (McWilliam et al. 2005).

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References and further reading

Byrne M, Gordon P. 2009. Seeds of Success: Using technology to help build a national collection of native seed. Public Garden 24(3):21–22. Available online (accessed 3 October 2011): www.nps.gov/plants/sos/news/Byrne%20and%20Gordon,%20Public%20Garden,%20vol24%20no%203.pdf.

Cavalcanti TB, Rezende A, Togawa R, Rodrigues P, Favilla LM, Neshich G. 1998. A new field-tested electronic system for gathering, recording, transfer and dissemination via the world wide web. Taxon 47(2):381–386. Available online (accessed 3 October 2011): www.cbi.cnptia.embrapa.br/~neshich/PDFs%20GN/7.8.pdf.

McWilliam N, Teeuw R, Whiteside M, Zukowskyj P. 2005. Field Techniques Manual: GIS, GPS and Remote Sensing. Royal Geographical Society, London. Available online (accessed 3 October 2011): www.rgs.org/NR/rdonlyres/8B549B39-9F2E-4D3B-B856-8A100AE2CCC2/0/Chapter13FieldEquipment.pdf.

Internet resources

BG-Base Collections Management Software: www.bg-base.com

United Kingdom Overseas Territories Species and Specimens Database: http://dps.plants.ox.ac.uk/bol/UKOT

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Chapter 22: Collecting vegetative material of forage grasses and legumes

J. Hanson
International Livestock Research Institute, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
E-mail: j.hanson(at)cgiar.org

M. van de Wouw
Centre for Genetic Resources (CGN), Wageningen University and Research Centre, The Netherlands
E-mail: markvandewouw(at)yahoo.co.uk

This chapter is a synthesis of new knowledge, procedures, best practices and references for collecting plant diversity since the publication of the 1995 volume Collecting Plant Diversity; Technical Guidelines, edited by Luigi Guarino, V. Ramanatha Rao and Robert Reid, and published by CAB International on behalf of the International Plant Genetic Resources Institute (IPGRI) (now Bioversity International), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the World Conservation Union (IUCN) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). The original text for Chapter 22: Collecting Vegetative Material of Forage Grasses and Legumes, authored by N. R. Sackville Hamilton and K. H. Chorlton, has been made available online courtesy of CABI. The 2011 update of the Technical Guidelines, edited by L. Guarino, V. Ramanatha Rao and E. Goldberg, has been made available courtesy of Bioversity International.

Please send any comments on this chapter using the Comments feature at the bottom of this page. If you wish to contribute new content or references on the subject please do so here.

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	Different forage grasses and legumes in a field genebank. (Photo: ILRI)

Abstract

Recent literature on forage collection has focused on seed collection, site selection and sampling strategy. New approaches using ecogeographical information and GIS mapping techniques have improved site selection targeting, sampling design and capture of more representative diversity from natural populations.

Introduction

While the reasons outlined in the original chapter for collecting forage grasses and legumes remain valid, a review of current literature comes up with very few references that cover collecting methods for vegetative material of forage grasses and legumes. As mentioned in the original chapter, the collection of vegetative material poses problems related to sample size, speed and transport due to the weight and bulk of vegetative cuttings compared to seeds. In addition, vegetative samples require more careful handling to avoid damage to the material before reaching the home base. This has led most collectors to focus on seed collection whenever possible and to avoid vegetative material by carefully timing collections to coincide with peak seed ripeness before shattering. Vegetative collection is usually restricted to those cases where it is the only practical option, such as for grass species that rarely or never produce seeds or for fodder trees that might take many years to flower and seed or when material is urgently required.

Current status

Recent advances in forage collection have focused on the use of targeting to better identify the areas and timing for collection. For example, the use of modelled ecogeographic attributes has been applied to the collection of forage germplasm in Southern Russia (Hart et al. 1996; Greene et al. 1999). The strategy for this collection was to make decisions on area and taxa for collection using map analysis combined with observations to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the sampling design. This approach allowed better targeting of sampling gradients across collection-site habitats in order to acquire forage germplasm adapted to a broad range of environmental conditions. It can be used for either vegetative or seed-producing species.

Several collections that have been made for forage legumes and grasses over the past 15 years have been reported in the Plant Genetic Resources Newsletter. The most recent of these are reports on collection of forage legumes in Greece (Shackle et al. 2001), Medicago in Kazakhstan (Greene et al. 2005), Centrosema, Stylosanthes and Desmodium in Venezuela (Guenni et al. 2006) and forage legumes and grasses in the Carpathian Mountains in Ukraine (Diederichsen et al. 2007). However, most have focused on seed collections, and the reports do not address collecting methodologies. Several do address the use of mapping and GIS to determine sampling strategy and site selection to maximize the capture of genetic diversity within target species. It is now common to use GIS datasets to identify areas with specific soil types or climatic conditions within the distributional range of a species in order to target specific collection sites with a high probability of finding genotypes with specific adaptations to edaphic factors, or to maximize landscape diversity in collections, as described in detail by Greene et al. (2005).

Future challenges/needs/gaps

The major challenge in the collection of forages as vegetative material is to find ways to use new developments in modified atmosphere packing to improve storage conditions during transport and to reduce the weight and bulk of cuttings but to still have sufficient material to increase survival rates during shipping back to base. If this challenge could be overcome, the advantages of collecting vegetative cuttings (which provide more rapid growth and establishment than seeds) could be realized.

Conclusions

Improved targeting using ecogeographical information and GIS mapping techniques have been applied to forage collection to improve sampling design and the capture of more representative diversity from natural populations. However, there have been few advances in the collecting methodology and practical methods of handling vegetative material in the field.

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References and further reading

Diederichsen A, Boguslavskij RL, Halan MS, Richards KW. 2007. Collecting plant genetic resources in the eastern Carpathian Mountains within the territory of Ukraine in 2005. Plant Genetic Resources Newsletter 151:14–21.

Greene SL, Hart TC, Afonin, A. 1999. Using geographic information to acquire wild crop germplasm for ex situ collections: I. Map development and field use. Crop Science 39:836-842.

Greene SL, Hannan R, Afonin A, Dzyubenko NI, Khusainov A. 2005. Collecting wild crop relatives in the northwestern steppes of Kazakhstan. Plant Genetic Resources Newsletter 141:1–6.

Guenni O, Calles T, Gil JL, Fariñas J, Rodríguez I, Espinoza F, Sanabria D, Schultze-Kraft R. 2006. Surveying and collecting native Centrosema, Stylosanthes, and Desmodium germplasm in Venezuela. Plant Genetic Resources Newsletter 148:38–43.

Hart TS, Greene SL, Afonin A. 1996. Mapping for germplasm collections: site selection and attribution. In: Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Integrating GIS and Environmental Modeling. National Center for Geographic Information and Analysis, Santa Barbara, CA. Available online (accessed 3 October 2011): www.ncgia.ucsb.edu/conf/SANTA_FE_CD-ROM/sf_papers/hart_thomas/thart.html.

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