Database and Description

Early Development of Wood Collection	Reorganization of Collection	Database and Description

Development of Database

In this age of computer technology, we are still using index cards to record all the information about each specimen, but we have developed a database for the MADw collection. In the late 1970s before the advent of desktop computers, I began entering wood collection data from MADw into a mainframe computer. FAMULUS, the program to manipulate the data, was written for bibliographic information, but it also worked for a "library" of woods. Since then, we have converted the program and data from a mainframe at the University of Wisconsin-Madison to a mini-computer at FPL and just recently to a Macintosh, where we use a program called Panorama. Of course, the greatest problem has been data editing, a neverending process. Since we did not have funds to accomplish the database quickly, we worked on it only as time and money allowed. Many students and part-time employees worked on the project, entering and editing data, although I had to do a certain portion of the editing. Now, we can enter new accessions directly into the database, print index cards, sort, search, create forms, and do a host of functions!

Description of MADw Collection

I examined the MADw database and accumulated some interesting facts. Our latest accession number is over 49000; however, 1,800 are still open numbers and nearly 2,000 specimens are being processed and have not yet been entered in the database. Presently, the database contains approximately 45,000 specimens, which are 91% hardwoods or dicotyledonous angiosperms. Represented are about 14,000 species, 3,000 genera, and 265 families. Of course, this does not account for the synonymy that exists in every xylarium and herbarium. The genus with the most species is Quercus with 222 species, followed by Eucalyptus with 144, and then Ficus with 127. However, the genus with the most specimens is Pinus with 1,311, followed by Quercus with 981. The four most common species are softwoods (gymnosperms): Pinus echinata P. Mill., P. ponderosa Douglas ex Lawson, P. palustris P. Mill., and Pseudotsuga menziesii (Mirb.) Franco, with 124, 122, 97, and 88 specimens, respectively. The two most common hardwoods are Cordia alliodora (Ruiz & Pavon) Oken (82 specimens) and Swietenia macrophylla King (61 specimens). As you can imagine, the family with the most specimens is Leguminosae (Fabaceae) with 5,491 specimens;1,724 species and 348 genera.

Based on geographic regions, the collection is 65% New World, i.e., 28,700 specimens of which 20,300 are from Latin America. The 35% Old World specimens come primarily from Asia (8,800 specimens) and Africa (4,400 specimens), and the remainder come from Australia, Europe, and the Pacific Islands. The country with the most specimens is the United States, with 8,300 specimens, followed by Brazil with 5,300, Peru with 3,100, Venezuela with 2,000, and the Philippines with 1,700.

As we added data to the database, we tried to determine whether the specimens were vouchered. If the specimens were vouchered, we included the Index Herbariorum acronym for the location of the vouchers (Holmgren et al. 1990); At present, I estimate that MADw contains 62% vouchered material, 8% not vouchered, and 30% with an uncertain status. For some of the latter material, we may yet determine if there are vouchers; for the rest, we may never know.

The collectors for MADw have been many and varied. There are well-known collectors such as M. Acosta-Solís, B. A. Krukoff, Llewelyn Williams, and Roger Dechamps, but many collectors are only represented by a few samples. Institutes such as the British Guiana Forestry Department and other xylaria such as USw (Smithsonian Institute) combine to constitute a large percentage of what we designate as collectors. These specimens were obtained through exchange and may represent many collectors. Llewelyn Williams collected the most (3,367), followed by B.A. Krukoff (3,168) and TERVw (2,222). Included in the TERVw specimen count is Roger Dechamps' personal collection of 1,435 specimens, the third largest personal collection. Williams, Krukoff, and Dechamps account for nearly 18% of the total number of MADw specimens.

One of the greatest benefits of computerizing a wood collection is learning more about the collection. Much of the learning is not in the final searches and sorts that can be done, but in the process of adding data about each specimen. It becomes a history lesson, a taxonomic lesson, and a geography lesson all rolled into one. As we continue to add and edit the MADw collection, we are continually learning and discovering.

Back to wood collections