Small Collections Grant
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Processing twenty years of backlog at J herbarium
South Africa
Process backlog
Cost (USD):
1500
J
University of Witwatersrand
Objective:
Our main objectives are to process ca. 20.000 specimens left unmounted and unidentified by previous curators (mount, database, photograph and include in the general collection).
Timetable:
The budget requested is presented in the Excel spreadsheet, with most of the money requested being to pay for student labour (287 hours for 1000 dollars), herbarium materials (400 dollars) and cloud storage (100 dollars). Within these 287 hours of paid student labour, we will be able to hire two to three students to work simultaneously in the herbarium: one mounting herbarium sheets, one databasing, and one taking photos of the newly incorporated specimens. At the end of two years, we will have a complete database and digital photographs for all our specimens, which will be shared online using the cloud services to be hired.
Scoring Rubric
Reviewer's name:
Collection Improvement (max. 120 points)
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Facilitating access to the physical collections by digitization (e.g., data entry, setting up database structure with an outline of the platform to be used, purchasing equipment, and imaging specimens) – up to 30 points.
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Enhancing physical collections by improving the conservation status of specimens in the herbarium (e.g., better folders, protecting covers, mounting paper, labeling, etc.) – up to 30 points.
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Curating specimens (e.g., updating families, species identification, identifying types) – up to 20 points.
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Increasing our understanding of the flora or funga by making new herbarium specimens available, such as processing of backlog or collecting and mounting of new specimens from understudied sites – up to 20 points.
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Securing collections by distribution of duplicates (or orphan collections) to other regional or international herbaria or shipping endangered collections to another herbarium – up to 20 points.
This proposal scores:
/120
Methods & Funding (max. 40 points)
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Match between the proposed budget and methods for the aims described – up to 10 points.
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Perceived need, the extent to which the project will benefit from IAPT funding: e.g., due to active floristic work or contribution to poorly collected sites, due to threatened conditions of collections, and for the degree of involvement of others (outreach and education). We give more points for herbaria in low- and middle-income countries – up to 20 points.
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Sharing duplicate specimens with other herbaria – up to 10 points.
This proposal scores:
/40
Broader Impacts (max. 40 points)
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Degree of regional importance of the collection or the taxonomic importance of the targeted collection – up to 10 points.
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The project will yield durable benefits (specimens, digitized metadata, databases, websites) – up to 15 points.
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The project involves outreach/mentoring and broad dissemination – up to 15 points.
This proposal scores:
/40
Year of last successful SCG application:
Has applicant applied for SCG before?:
Plan:
The C.E. Moss Herbarium (J) is one of the oldest herbaria within the grasslands and savannas of South Africa. It currently comprises ca. 150,000 specimens from arid regions of South Africa, Namibia, Mozambique, Botswana, and Angola. Recently, our collection incorporated the J.E. Burrows herbarium due to an IAPT grant granted to our former curator, Dr Glynis Chron. Even though the Burrows collection is currently fully incorporated into the main collection at J herbarium, we still have several cupboards full of unmounted specimens inside newspaper sheets collected by previous curators and retired researchers. This prominent backlog is now around 20.000 unmounted historical specimens that need to be urgently processed. As the new botanical curator, I intend to use the money from this grant to hire undergrad and grad students from Wits to help our herbarium manager process all of these unmounted specimens. At the end of this project, our primary goal is to complete our metadata and photographic database to finally make them available online for the botanical community worldwide. This last step would be to buy cloud storage services and link them to the Herbarium official webpage. I estimate that this project would take two years to be completed since most students can only work 2 to 4 hours every week due to their busy schedules. We have a significant influx of students, with classes comprising around 70 undergrads and 20 postgrads.
Institution:
IH Code:
Country:
Target areas:
Applicant First Name/s:
email:
"Other" target:
Rafael Felipe de Almeida
Applicant Last Name/s: