The New York Botanical Garden and the making of The Bahama Flora, 1920

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, The New York Botanical Garden, under the leadership of its Director-in-Chief, Nathaniel Lord Britton, launched an intensive program of exploration and publication on the plants of the Western Hemisphere, particularly in the northern Caribbean region. One major geographic focus during this period was the Bahama archipelago, resulting in the 1920 publication The Bahama Flora. Dr. Britton personally led four expeditions to the Bahamas between 1904 and 1907, but most of his effort on this project was devoted to coordinating and seeking funding for some two dozen expeditions from 1904 to 1911 undertaken by collaborators, most notably Charles Frederick Millspaugh of the Field Museum, co-author with N.L. Britton of The Bahama Flora. In total, the Flora reported 1,982 species. The present paper recounts the itineraries of the expeditions and provides examples of the principal botanical discoveries realized in the making of The Bahama Flora.     

Collecting collections: building the library of The New York Botanical Garden

The history of the collections in the Library of The New York Botanical Garden includes the acquisition of previously accumulated collections as well as individual items acquired in the normal course of collection development. Particularly during the first 50 years of the institution, collections of library materials were acquired along with herbaria specimens, and, occasionally, collections of living plants, assembled by an individual as part of his or her personal research interests. While curatorial practice dictates that such an assemblage of research materials be separated when shifted from individual to institutional curatorship, the knowledge of the whole of the collection as received may fill in the background pattern of institutional collection development. A chronological table of these collections is appended, including reference to any extended discussion or listing.     

Type specimens of Polygonum (Polygonaceae) in the Meisner herbarium at the New York Botanical Garden

Carl Friedrich Meisner (1800–1874) described 186 new taxa inPolygonum in his series of publications. This paper provides the list of type, specimens ofPolygonum found in the Meisner herbarium at the New York Botanical Garden. One hundred fifty-eight, types and possible types representing 108Polygonum taxa described by Meisner have been located.     

A short description of the collections of The New York Botanical Garden Herbarium (NY)

An overview of the phanerogamic and cryptogamic collections accumulated by The New York Botanical Garden Herbarium (NY) since its foundation in 1891 is presented. Appended are a list of herbaria incorporated into NY, a list of collectors who have deposited their original herbaria or significant parts thereof at NY, a list of the taxonomic groups particularly well represented at NY, and a list of papers published since 1963 about the NY collections.     

Memories of the 1950s at The New York Botanical Garden

Memories of The New York Botanical Garden during the 1950s are given.     

The bryophyte collections of Wabash College Herbarium (WAB) now at the New York Botanical Garden (NY)

The bryophyte portion of the Wabash College Herbarium (WAB) consists of the personal herbaria of two faculty members: Drs. R. L. Laubengayer and A. R. Bechtel. Together, there were 1483 packets of bryophyte specimens. Most of the collections are from New York, Indiana, and Puerto Rico. Among them, ten represent new county records for New York mosses.Pseudocrossidium aureum is reported as new to California.Orthotrichum sordidum andPylaisiella selwynii are newly identified from a Puerto Rican collection by Laubengayer. The West Indian records of these two species, however, are only doubtfully accepted. In addition, a short biographical sketch is presented for R. L. Laubengayer.     

Collections from the Gettysburg College Herbarium now deposited at The New York Botanical Garden Herbarium (NY)

Brittonia - A total of 555 older specimens from the herbarium of Gettysburg College, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, were donated to The New York Botanical Garden in April 1993 and have been intercalated...     

Piperaceae types from the T. G. Yuncker Herbarium (DPU) now filed in the New York Botanical Garden Herbarium (NY)

Five hundred sixty-one type specimens, representing 522 basionyms, of Piperaceae have been verified among the specimens of Piperaceae acquired by the New York Botanical Garden (NY) in the purchase of the Truman G. Yuncker Herbarium of DePauw University (DPU) in 1987. Included are types of 319 names published by T. G. Yuncker, as well as smaller numbers of types of names published by Trelease, C. de Candolle, Miquel, and others. Geographic emphasis of the specimens is on tropical America, particularly Brazil and Honduras, and the South Pacific. An index to the types, which includes basionym, place of publication, kind of type, and country of origin and collection number of type, is included.     

Notable collections represented in the Truman G. Yuncker Herbarium (DPU), now deposited at The New York Botanical Garden (NY)

The integration of the vascular plants from the Yuncker Herbarium (DPU) into the New York Botanical Garden Herbarium (NY) has been completed, and the curatorial work is summarized. The most notable vascular plant collections, with emphasis on the local collections from Indiana, are reported on and a list of the most prominent collectors is presented. An index to all collectors of vascular plants represented in the Yuncker Herbarium has been deposited in the New York Botanical Garden Library.     

Brief history of and collector's index to the Wabash College Herbarium (WAB), now deposited at The New York Botanical Garden (NY)

The Wabash College Herbarium (WAB), Crawfordsville, Indiana, was donated to The New York Botanical Garden (NY) in 1987. Brief sketches of those who shaped the Wabash College Herbarium, including Albert Reiff Bechtel and Aris Berkeley Donaldson, are presented; photographs of Bechtel and Donaldson are provided. Collectors represented in WAB are listed including the localities and years of the collections and the total number of specimens contributed.     

A brief history of the Wellesley College Herbarium (WELC) and a list of its type specimens of vascular plants now deposited at The New York Botanical Garden Herbarium (NY)

The majority of the Wellesley College Herbarium (62, 193 specimens) has been intercalated into The New York Botanical Garden Herbarium (NY). Duplicated collections were distributed to other herbaria. Most specimens has been collected between 1850 and 1940. A brief history of the Wellesley Herbarium is given, and lists of the vascular plant type specimens and of some notable collectors of vascular plants are appended.     

Type specimens of vascular plants in the T.G. Yuncker Herbarium of Depauw University (DPU), now deposited at the New York Botanical Garden (NY)

A list of 226 vascular plant type specimens, representing 220 basionyms, found during the incorporation of the DePauw University Herbarium (DPU) into the New York Botanical Garden Herbarium (NY), is presented. Included are the types from Truman G. Yuncker's numerous expeditions to Honduras and the South Pacific. Lists of the types found in the Piperaceae, Cuscutaceae, and cryptogamic collections are being published elsewhere or have already appeared.     

Index to collectors and type specimens represented in the portion of Hobart and William Smith Colleges Herbarium (DH) deposited at New York Botanical Garden (NY) in 1983

An index to the collectors and types included in the portion of the Hobart and William Smith Colleges Herbarium (DH) recently deposited at the New York Botanical Garden (NY) is presented.     

El fenómeno de las caídas en residencias e instituciones: revisión del Grupo de Trabajo de Osteoporosis,Caídas y Fracturas de la Sociedad Española de Geriatría y Gerontología (GCOF-SEGG)

The Workshop on Osteoporosis, Falls and Fractures (GCOF) of The Spanish Geriatrics and Gerontology Society (SEGG) formed a committee in order to review the state of the art on the detection, risk factors and assessment tools for falls, and intervention protocols when falls occurs in nursing homes, long-term hospitals or medium-stay units. The different patient profiles are described in order to make a comprehensive approach to this heterogeneous topic and population, offering a risk classification and specific advice according to these categories.     

Análisis de la distribución geográfica de los anomuros (Crustacea: Decapoda) del Golfo de California,México

The anomuran crabs are important from the biogeographic perspective because of their benthonic behavior in their adult state. For this reason, the present work summarizes the different studies developed to date on these crustaceans within the Gulf of California and reinforces the separation of the zone from others in the Province of Cortéz, or Cortesiana. The Gulf of California is inhibited by seventy-eight species of anomurans, belonging to seven families and twenty-eight genera. The best represented family regarding the number of genera (eleven), species (forty-five) and endemic species (eleven) is the Porcellanidae, followed by the Diogenidae with eight genera, fifteen species and four endemic species. The Gulf of California species are distributed in three large zoogeographical groups in the Eastern Pacific, the main one being the Panamic with an intrusion to the Gulf of 69.23% of the species reported. A second important group is that of the endemic species of the Gulf, with 24.35% of the existing species. The boreal species group with intrusion to the Gulf is present with 6.41%. Within the Californian Gulf, ten different zoogeographical groups are found, which demonstrate the great complexity of anomuran distribution, a product of the evolutionary history of this interior sea.     

The herbarium of Paul A. Fryxell (pf) and U.S. Department of Agriculture, College Station, Texas, integrated into The New York Botanical Garden Herbarium (NY)

The herbarium specimens amassed by Paul A. Fryxell while working at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, College Station, Texas, were moved in October 1993 to The New York Botanical Garden and integrated into the Herbarium in 1994. The collection is particularly rich in specimens of the Malvaceae and other families of the Malvales, the areas of Fryxell’s taxonomic specialty. Also included is the cotton reference herbarium of the former Cotton Branch of the Agricultural Research Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, which consists of voucher specimens of germplasm introductions of cotton (Gossypium) from expeditions and from test plots in the United States and Mexico. A total of 19,918 specimens, including 167 type specimens, have been incorporated into The New York Botanical Garden Herbarium.