Herbarium

History

One often considers that the inventor of the herbarium is Luca Ghini (1500 - 1556), Botaniste Italy N, professor of botany to Bologna. Its herbarium of 300 plants was not preserved. One of oldest is probably that of Felix Platter (1536 - 1614), doctor with Basle. At the national Muséum of natural history of Paris is preserved an herbarium going back to 1558, a small volume connected containing 313 plants collected by Jehan Girault, doctor Lyons.

Finalities and uses

The designation of the standard and the indication of the place where the herbarium is preserved are obligatory today during the publication of new a Taxon botanical or mycologic (see Holotype).

The herbaria are thus essential with the study Taxinomique of the plants (their botanical characters), of their geographical distribution, allowing the determination and the comparison of specimens leading to the publication of new a taxon or, on the contrary, to detect a superfluous synonym, thus contributing to the stabilization of the nomenclature.

The herbaria (when they were suitably dried) also appear a useful source of DNA for studies Phylogénétique S (Cladistique). Old herbaria can allow an extraction, but generally, it proves that one cannot reasonably exceed a few years. In addition, any vegetable material preserved in alcohol is unusable. As one took the practice to take at the same time as the specimen, a piece of sheet which especially will be treated and dehydrated in silica gel (silicagel).

Constitution of an herbarium

A little good sense must be a precondition to very undertaken serious of constitution of an important herbarium. The rare and threatened plants would not have, in all logic, to belong to a personal herbarium. The works of determination which one finds in the rays of the bookstores are in general sufficient to identify the most common species, but often comprise few indications on protected spaces. The ideal being to limit the wild taking away to the only exits framed by botanists or teachers informed within the framework of an approved association.

In the case of the constitution of an herbarium with teaching goal, one can recommend the following councils:

to collect only individuals whose identification is not any doubt;
not to collect isolated individuals or present of small number: it is imagined easily that an small group of plants completely insulated, of some individuals only, can potentially see the latter belonging to a not very common species in the sector. But attention, one can fall very well on the most abundant station for a single species in the world, it is not in so far as one can collect this species;
for the botanists amateurs, it can be very useful to get the list of the plant species protected in the area or the department where one prospects, in order to avoid an accidental gathering.

Paul Baker, botanist French author of the Four flora of France specifies rightly: Let us not treat the rare plant in simple object of collection and let us not exterminate it in its stations to satisfy a simple passion turned to the mania. To destroy what one likes is a rather bad way of aimer.

Collect

It is necessary to envisage:

of the sheets of blotter to a3 format folded into two, which will form the books of harvest. It is in general necessary to envisage some much: one by variety of plant;
of the labels to number each sample, on which one will take care well to note at least the date and the place of harvest.

For the handymen and according to the needs, the presses with herbaria can be replaced by grids of refrigerators which will be tightened by two straps. If one wants to collect only small samples, a phone book can prove extremely useful.

On the ground:

to take a whole plant, or only representative pieces (flowers, sheets, seeds, possibly roots); for each species, to take at least two individuals, one will be dried, the second will be used for the identification;
to place them in a book of harvest with the label for identification.
a piece of sheet torn in squares of 5 mm could be placed in silicagel for the studies of DNA, in order to be dehydrated quickly.

Drying

Ideally, it is necessary to be able to have:

two planks of wood, 30x40 cm, in agglomerate, or better, in lathed;
of many layers: sheets of newspapers folded into two and crossed in 30x40

For each plant, one opens a layer, folding on the left, and one poses the plant to be dried flat on the page of right-hand side, with much of care (not to fold the teeth), one adds the label to it, one closes again, and one places the whole in a layer folding on the right.

On a board which will be that of the lower part to place:

four layers, foldings positioned on the left;
a plant;
four layers, foldings positioned on the left;
a plant…

To finish by four layers, and to place the board of the top.

To tighten the whole, one uses either of the straps, or 4 threaded rods with nuts, with each corner, (but in this case the boards, perforated, must be larger than the layers), or more simply while placing the whole by ground, and by posing an unspecified weight above. But to start, or during collections not envisaged, far from its material of personal drying, it is completely possible to use sheets of newspapers simply in a hurry under a paperboard filled or any very heavy object. It is preferable, for drying, not to use glazed paper. One can also dry them with iron to pass by again between absorbing paper.

Maintenance

During the three or the first four days, it is recommended to change all the newspapers according to the advance of drying, then the next days, all both or three days, until complete drying.

The professionals also use on the ground of the driers which are composed of a source of heat (oil heaters or gas) and of a device making it possible to make circulate the hot air inside the packages of specimens. The plants dry thus in a few days. When the studied zone is vraimemt too distant and that it is not possible to make dry the herbaria on the spot, it is possible to soak the packages with alcohol with 60 degrees and to preserve them several weeks in plastic bags strong like those used on the building sites. Traditional drying is then made with the return forwarding.

Once the complete drying of all the sheets, the sample is ready to enter the herbarium. One can then lay out the plant correctly on a sheet, with the references which one preserved since his collection. The large herbaria presented in the following chapters in general specify the Latin name and the name Vernaculaire of the sample, the date and the place of harvest, and sometimes an indication of the habitat in which the plant was collected.

A special mention relates to the vernacular name. The large herbaria which are data sources, will allow, between thousand other things, to publish works, the flora. These flora will mention the vernacular names which are reproduced on the samples. If the botanist recopies on his herbarium the vernacular names given in the books, it is advisable to quote its source, in order to avoid a circular reasoning (herbaria quoting of the works which take as a starting point the herbaria). But the statement D an original vernacular name is a useful data and must appear, as well as the vernacular language. Ideally, the name of L adviser, and some data on its sphere of knowledge (Shaman, man in the street, child…) must appear, although actually, few people do it.

Correctly preserved safe from the light, moisture and the phytophagous and xylophagous insects, an herbarium can be preserved a whole life and much longer still in certain great botanical institutions.

Large herbaria of the world

In the large collections gathering of the species of the whole world, several tens of samples of each plant can be gathered. In the course of time, each institutional herbarium thus gathered the samples collected by several botanist-collectors, in the most various areas of the world. Each sample carries a label precisely mentioning the name of the collector, the date and the place of collection, the Latin name that the sample initially received (as well as the possible corrections carried out by the successive researchers), and of the indications of color, size, port, and volume of the plant in natural environment.

The herbarium of the national Muséum of natural history of Paris which counts approximately eight million samples is, numerically, most important of the world (290 000 species present on the 320 000 counted vascular species). The collections preserved in these large herbaria are held with the provision of the botanists of the whole world. A selection of samples can be sent in loan of an establishment to another for more convenience, but the most invaluable collections do not travel: they are the researchers who come to consult them, sometimes since the other end of the world.

The boards are classified according to the Nom binominal of the Espèce and are grouped by rows taxinomic growing, according to the traditional Systématique:

all harvests representing same a Espèce are gathered. There is thus coast beside the plants which can be collected on two different continents and at two centuries different, but pertaining to the same species. That allows in particular a precise study on the natural distribution of the species, and on the evolution of this distribution in time;
then all the species belonging to same the kind are gathered;
and finally all the kinds of same a family are gathered.

A list of the large herbaria on a world level is held up to date and published under the name of Index herbariorum . Each large collection is identified by a code to one, two or three letters. For example the British Museum, section Natural history, is coded BM.

The Harvard University Herbaria is the eighth herbarium of the world with more than five million specimens.

Herbaria available on Internet

One finds on Internet a certain number of herbaria published by institutions. As example, the herbarium of Lamarck, which is with the National Herbarium of Paris to the national Natural history museum, published under the aegis of CNRS, is available to the following address:

Herbarium of Lamarck - www.lamarck.cnrs.fr

The Sonnerat/Bryomyco database initially intended to computerize the national Herbarium is used on line by several institutions: herbaria of Montpellier (MPU), of Nancy (NCY), of Limoges (LIMO), Dijon and Cherbourg (CHE), without forgetting that of the harmas of Fabre (FABR). It contains in 2006 more than 500.000 recordings and more than 40.000 photographs of specimens on line. It is consultable with the following address:

national Herbarium of the national Natural history museum of natural history

There exist also virtual herbaria, made up of illustrated cards of digital photographs of samples of plants presented as in a real herbarium. As example, for the Paris region, the virtual flora of Orsay, with the following address:

virtual Flora of Orsay
virtual Herbarium of the university Laval, Montreal, Canada

herbarium MPU of the botanical Institute of Montpellier
Herbarium of the toxic plants of the French flora

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