Realising the potential of herbarium records for conservation biology

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Authors

Greve, Michelle
Lykke, Anne Mette
Fagg, Christopher W.
Gereau, Roy E.
Lewis, Gwilym P.
Marchant, Rob
Marshall, Andrew R.
Ndayishimiye, Joël
Bogaert, Jan
Svenning, Jens-Christian

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Publisher

Elsevier

Abstract

One of the major challenges in ecosystem conservation is obtaining baseline data, particularly for regions that have been poorly inventoried, such as regions of the African continent. Here we use a database of African herbarium records and examples from the literature to show that, although herbarium records have traditionally been collected to build botanical reference “libraries” for taxonomic and inventory purposes, they provide valuable and useful information regarding species, their distribution in time and space, their traits, phenological characteristics, associated species and their physical environment. These data have the potential to provide invaluable information to feed into evidence-based conservation decisions.

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Keywords

Biological collections, Database, Historical records, Label information, Long-term data collections, Trait

Sustainable Development Goals

Citation

Greve, M, Lykke, AM, Fagg, CW, Gereau, RE, Lewis, GP, Marchant, R, Marshall, AR, Ndayishimiye, J, Bogaert, J & Svenning, J-C 2016, 'Realising the potential of herbarium records for conservation biology', South African Journal of Botany, vol. 105, pp. 317-323.