The NEBS Cryptogams Herbarium
Housed in the Farlow Herbarium, the NEBS (acronym NEBC) Cryptogams Herbarium has over 7,500 collections of New England lichens, bryophytes, algae, and fungi collected by the early members of the botanical club and other regional botanists such as W. G. Farlow, J. F. Collins, E. D. Merrill, C. G. Pringle, E. B. Chamberlain, E. B. Harger and C. E. Cummings. The more recent collections include those of D. R. Bowley, who worked on lichens on the summit of Mt Mansfield, VT.
The focus of the ongoing curatorial work is the preservation of the 19th century collections and the identification of collections with no or questionable identifications.
The curatorial work has dovetailed with the HUH digitization projects, and the NEBS lichen and bryophyte collections can now be accessed by going to:
Bryophyte Packets. Click on Image.
Lichen portal: https://lichenportal.org/portal/
Bryophyte portal: https://bryophyteportal.org/portal/
HUH website for both lichens and bryophytes: https://huh.harvard.edu/pages/digital-resources
Shortly, 500 NEBS fungal collections will be accessible on line by going to the
Macrofungal portal: https://mycoportal.org//portal/index.php
or at the HUH website (address above).
People
Curator of Cryptogams: Elizabeth Kneiper (ekneiper@aol.com)
Assistant Curator: Allen Milby (amilby@fas.harvard.edu)
Associate Curator: Dr. Michaela Schmull (mschmull@oeb.harvard.edu)
Visiting the NEBS Cryptogams Herbarium:
Visitors are welcome. Please contact Elizabeth Kneiper (ekneiper@aol.com) and Dr. Michaela Schmull (mschmull@oeb.havard.edu).
Requests for Loans:
All NEBS Cryptogams Herbarium loan requests are arranged through the Harvard University Herbaria. Please mail loan requests to: huh-requests@oeb.harvard.edu
Volunteering
The NEBS Cryptogams Herbarium welcomes volunteers willing to do curatorial work, collection identifications and data entry. Please contact Elizabeth Kneiper. (ekneiper@aol.com)
The digitization projects at HUH include only minimal data capture. Volunteers who would like to become citizen scientists can volunteer to complete the entry of data off the labels on collections by going to the sites listed below.
Tips for data entry can be found at: https://lbcc1.acis.ufl.edu
For lichens: https://lichenportal.org/portal/
For bryophytes (mosses, liverworts and hornworts): https://bryophyteportal.org/portal
Interested mycologists can visit the following website to earn spore, mycelium, and mushroom badges for their data entry: www.notesfromnature.org