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DIGITAL FLORA. La Selva Biological Station. Supported by:. Website: http://www.ots.ac.cr/floradigital. PI's Donald E. Stone, Duke University Charlotte M. Taylor, Missouri Botanical Garden Deedra McClearn, La Selva Biological Station. An International Team. RESEARCH TEAM
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DIGITAL FLORA La Selva Biological Station Supported by: Website: http://www.ots.ac.cr/floradigital
PI's Donald E. Stone, Duke University Charlotte M. Taylor, Missouri Botanical Garden Deedra McClearn, La Selva Biological Station An International Team • RESEARCH TEAM • Enrique Castro (La Selva) • José González (La Selva) • Nelson Zamora (La Selva, INBio) • Orlando Vargas (La Selva) • Rossilynn Valverde (La Selva) • Mike Grayum (MBG) • MBG Herbarium & Imaging Group • Duke University Herbarium
History • In 1979 only 710 species were recorded. • Duke University (Wilbur & collaborators) started the plant inventory project in the late 70's, this initiative compiled a plant list of 1,678 species and 20,000 + specimens to 1988. • In the late 90’s the students and researchers demonstrated the need for an easy tool to identify plants. • In 1999 La Selva staff started the project. • From 2000-2003 proposals were submitted with no success. • In 2003 MBG was invited to collaborate. • 2004 NSF and CR-USA approved two complementary proposals; marking the official start of the Flora project in collaboration with MBG (project ending June, 2008).
Objectives • Inventory all the plant species (2,000+) known from La Selva.-- never fully done before, and not a simple task. • Compile information, including phenology, photos and observations of living plants, and ecology -- some of the species are barely known to science. • Create a web site and electronic tools for identification of the La Selva plant species -- for the first time. This includes four main components: • Species Web pages • Interactive electronic keys • Image gallery • Search engine on images and taxonomy • To complete La Selva's reference herbarium
A Digital Flora Advantage: Compared to traditional printed botanical texts, this tool allows: • Frequent updates, to add changes and information. • Access to the data available now, without waiting for every last part to be finalized. • Includes digital tools, such as interactive keys, dynamic lists, search engines, images gallery. • Has extensive and flexible content for one price, because space is not limiting. • Direct download of information to handhelds, laptops, etc. • Links to other web pages with additional information.
La Selva Plant Composition Query1 Query1 Updated: May. 08
Products Up to Date • 228 new species added (1,834 in Aug. 2003 vs. 2,062 species May. 2008) • 120 Family treatments (61 edited), + 15 family summaries of the 161 families: taxonomy, morphology and descriptions are illustrated with images. • 20,000+ images representing +1,650 species, equivalent to 80% of total species, 90% of all genera and 100% of all families. • A multiple access electronic key to families of angiosperms and gymnosperms of La Selva, besides more than 30 electronic dichotomous keys to genera. • Around 2,100 new botanical collections, consisting of 4,800 specimens. (50% located at La Selva´s herbarium and the remaining were sent to other herbaria) • 23,500 records with data available in TROPICOS of the plant specimens collected in La Selva at previous years. • Close to 2,500 digitalized herbarium specimens, representing ~1,500 spp., also available in TROPICOS. With this the image gallery illustrates ~ 1,900 spp.
Let’s practice on the web !!! http://www.ots.ac.cr/floradigital Florula website visitorsin four months: ~5,000 unique visitors from 30 countries (CRI, MEX, COL, USA).