Introduction

Welcome to the Gymnosperm Database, the web's premier source of information on conifers and their allies. Since we went online on 1997, the Database has attracted worldwide attention as a readily accessible, scientifically accurate source of information on the classification, description, ecology and uses of this culturally and ecologically important group of plants. This home page gives some hints about how to navigate the Database, as well as providing background information for the curious.

Quick Links

There are four major sections of the site:

The Taxa section is accessed through the selection box at the left. The pull-down box allows you to jump to any of the Classes or Families of gymnosperms. From there, additional pull-down boxes allow you to jump to genera, and then to species. In this way you are three mouse clicks away from any of the approximately 1,000 species (including subspecies and varieties) of gymnosperms. This section comprises about 90 percent of the site.

The Topics section is accessed through this link, or through links at the head and foot of almost every page. It discusses things that are not strictly tied to a particular species or taxon. For instance, it includes pages on the gymnosperms of Australia, the oldest trees in the world, and accounts of some of my field excursions. If you are just interested in exploring the site, I encourage you to read the material below, and then surf over to Topics.

The Bookstore is where you can go shopping. Most of the books are linked through Amazon, and if you buy them through this site, the price is the same to you but some of the proceeds come to me, to help support the Database. Some books aren't available through Amazon but I list them anyway, because in the Bookstore I try to give you access to every important gymnosperm publication currently in print.

The Links and Site Map pages are self-explanatory.

Background on the Site

The Gymnosperm Database was established as an online entity in the summer of 1997 and has since grown steadily, getting its own URL (Conifers.org) in the summer of 1999. Currently the Database provides basic information (sometimes only a name) for all species and higher-ranked taxa of the gymnosperms, i.e., conifers, cycads, and their allies. You enter the taxonomic tree at the Family level and then navigate to the Genus, Species or sometimes Variety levels. At each level, information on the taxon at hand is provided, along with bibliographic citations that will take you to more detailed information about the taxon. If you are using a browser that does not support forms, a site map is provided Here.

How to Use This Site

If you have a specific question, use the search box at left. Otherwise, I suggest that you start with the Topics page. If you prefer, you are welcome to browse the species accounts, although I caution you that many of them are pretty skimpy. If you want to see some of the most complete and detailed descriptions, a good place to start is the Topics pages on Gymnosperms of Alta California, Gymnosperms of Australia, and Gymnosperms of New Zealand. Those three parts of the world are pretty well covered in the Database, as are Canada and the western United States (see "Place Names", below). Southeast Asia and adjacent Oceania are pretty well covered, though mostly based on fairly old information. Coverage of Europe and Asia is uneven, with some species well docummented and others almost blank. Africa and South America, which have few conifers, are also very unevenly covered. Cycads are largely neglected because an excellent site, The Cycad Pages, exists to provide the same sort of information that I would otherwise have to collect. The Gnetales are covered here better than anywhere else on the web - but that isn't saying much.

Place Names

For all place names I use the common English name (e.g., "Spain" instead of "España"). I try to name every nation that each species is native to. For species native to Canada, the United States, Mexico, Australia, and China, I try to name every state or province that each species is native to. Abbreviations are not used. This information will help you in geographic searches. For instance, to find all the gymnosperms native to Iowa, simply type in the search term "Iowa."

Computer stuff

In order to navigate through the various taxa, you need to use a browser that supports forms and javascript. Version 4 or better of both Netscape and Internet Explorer will work. The site looks best in Firefox. Personally, I use Firefox more than anything else, and you should give it a whirl, especially if you're currently laboring under the impression that Internet Exploder is a functional piece of software.

The Database is not a "real" database. I tried running it with Microsoft Access, but over a period of years, I gradually decided that the uniform presentation and organization provided by a database is not especially useful for the purposes of the Gymnosperm Database. So, nowadays it simply consists of a large collection of HTML files (mostly W3C compliant HTML 4.01). The benefit of this is that I spend more time writing about gymnosperms and less time programming. The liability is that the different files do not have the same "look," especially since stylesheets have been retrofitted to many of the older pages. For instance, some files have have a fixed width, but older ones will stretch all the way across your 21-inch monitor (if that's what you have). The website code is written with Arachnophilia, a freeware program, or BBEdit, which is not free but is very good if you're using a Mac (which I have been since 2006).

Links to citations pop up an a small window, like this. Links to photos also generally pop up in a window, though a few take you offsite. Other onsite links take you directly to the linked page, while offsite links generally open in a new browser window (unless your browser is set to open new windows in a new tab).

One consequence of the longevity of the database is that the graphics quality varies quite a bit. When I started out, everybody was working on a 640×480 pixel screen and images larger than 20 KB took forever to download. So, some of the old images on the site are quite small. Currently the site is laid out to fit in an 800×600 window (though some photos need a larger screen to display at full resolution) and some of the pictures are over 100 KB, although such pictures larger than 10 KB are only shown in pop-up windows. If you are using a lower-resolution screen, or if the images seem intolerably small on your 1600×1200 pixel screen, then I suggest using an image viewer with fit-to-screen zoom capabilities to examine the image files. My favorite freeware viewer is IrfanView. Digital photography from 2001 to 2003 was mostly taken using an Olympus C700Z, shooting high-definition JPGs at 1600×1200 resolution. Since summer 2004, I'm using an Olympus C5060, which takes 5-megapixel images and is built like a brick. I love this camera.

Appeal for volunteer assistance

People sometimes write and say, "Who writes the database?" The answer is, I do. I have assembled most of the database and done essentially all of the computer-based work: typing, scanning images, writing code, etc. Any assistance IS WELCOMED. To date I have received helpful advice from a variety of recognized taxonomic authorities, as well as information on individual taxa from persons scattered across the globe. Indeed, the correspondence related to this site has itself provided great pleasure and much insight to the manifold problems extant in gymnosperm taxonomy, and provides one of the greatest rewards of maintaining this site. However, if you would like to increase those rewards, you could buy some books (from Amazon.com) via my gateway/bookstore located HERE.