Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Variable nascent inflorescence orientation in Arctostaphylos crustacea



Nascent inflorescence deployment is a ecologically interesting feature of manzanitas.  In many species of Arctostaphylos, the inflorescences differentiate and grow in the late summer or fall, only to remain dormant for several months until the onset of flowering in the late winter or spring.

Generally,  characters of the nascent inflorescences are useful in distinguishing some species of manzanitas.  Wells (2000), in his tome “The Manzanitas of California”, recognized Section Nematonascens, consisting of 6 species with erect or gracile nascent inflorescences.  Subsequent phlyllogenetic reconstruction using molecular data (Walhert et al. J. Bot. Res. Inst. Texas 3(2): 673 – 682. 2009) suggests that Section Nematonascens is artificial, or at least that one member Wells attributed to this Section, A. australis of the coast of Baja California within the California Floristic Province, is not related to other Nematonascens (specifically, to A. densiflora or A. stanfordiana).

Arctostaphylos crustacea ssp. crustacea is a common manzanita in central coastal California.  Occasional individuals of A. c. ssp. crustacea exhibit variable inflorescence deployment: some individuals in a population have the nascent inflorescences pendant , while less frequently, rare individuals have erect nascent inflorescences.   In those rare individuals, as the wet season progresses and the flowers begin to differentiate, their stiffly erect nascent inflorescences turn downward and become essentially pendant.




The two photos show nascent inflorescence orientation of a single individual, the top photo taken Dec 11 2012 and the second below taken Jan 21 2013.

Whether or not variable nascent inflorescence reflects a rare, genetically determined heterochrony merits consideration.

Wednesday, January 2, 2013

California Floristics – data analysis progress of 2 million herbarium specimens


I could not find that the Consortium of California Herbaria website had done an overall assessment of data entry progress – so I compiled the statistics below.  As of the 18 October 2012 summary by institution for the 20 listed herbaria, 70.1% of the reported 2,215,256 California specimens have been databased.

This is a quite important and remarkable proportion.

Assessment of the overall pattern of endemism and endangerment in the California flora has before now been largely a personalized, experiential process.  Data crunching has played a minor role here and there in papers, yes.  But largely the classic papers and patterns are the product of botanists summarizing their field experience.  Miles driven.  Campfires lit.  Cans of beans consumed.

At this juncture, I suggest that a second aspect of herbarium specimen digitization is needed: analysis. We have 70% of the data.  Now we need to augment additional data capture with data rectification -cleaning up heteroduplicates, data entry errors, incomplete dates or incomplete collection numbers, inconsistencies in data entry between herbaria, incorrect counties etc.   Georeferencing is also well along. 

The CCH 20 institution summary statistics as of 18 October 2012 are:

Herbarium
CA entered
Total CA
CA to go
% entered
CAS/DS
151105
520000
368895
29.1
CDA
24117
30000
5883
80.4
CHSC
69658
73381
3723
94.9
CSUSB
2003
4800
2797
41.7
DAV
70824
150000
79176
47.2
HSC
68758
80000
11242
85.9
IRVC
5675
30100
24425
18.9
OBI
11628
56000
44372
20.8
PGM
7591
7600
9
99.9
RSA/POM
384941
425958
41017
90.4
SBBG
93822
120000
26178
78.2
SCFS
1000
3000
2000
33.3
SD
110851
111000
149
99.9
SDSU
16281
16281
0
100.0
SJSU
9556
10136
580
94.3
UC/JEPS
359000
360000
1000
99.7
UCR
134204
134500
296
99.8
UCSB
17905
65000
47095
27.5
UCSC
6187
9500
3313
65.1
YM
7878
8000
122
98.5
TOTAL
1552984
2215256
662272
70.1