One of the glories of the Internet is the ability to access otherwise inaccessible material. No, we’re not suggesting erotica so much as exotica – botanical exotica at that.
Gardeners all too often encounter reproductions of aged plant art or even whole pages from equally aged tomes in modern horticultural magazines and books. The originals are safely locked away in libraries limited to scientific specialists in systemic botany – the science of plant identification.
The Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis is already famous to those with web fingers. The Missouri Botanical Garden Library has been digitizing materials from its collections since 1995, focusing primarily on illustrated volumes in the rare book collection.
Now enter Botanicus, a web-based, freely accessible encyclopedia of digitalized 18th and 19th century botanical literature. The project, funded by the W. M. Keck Foundation, is a treasure trove for scientists seeking the older literature essential to their studies. The library notes that there are over 67,000 systemic botanical publications in existence, but only the most recent published are in digitalized form.
Keen and curious gardeners will also revel and romp through this site, however, the principal problem as with many a botanical garden is knowing when to leave.
www.botanicus.org
Dr. Karl
Once upon time, by his own admission, he was a “proper pukka scientist, engineer and doctor.” But not any longer.
He has found work as a physicist, labourer. ‘roadie’ for bans, car mechanic, filmmaker, hospital scientific officer, biomedical engineer, television weatherman and medical doctor at a hospital for children.
In Canada, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation treats us to the pseudoscience of David Suzuki. Australians, through their national broadcaster, are luckier. Few from the southern continent remain ignorant of “Dr. Karl,” thanks to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation – and Karl Kruszelnicki himself.
“Dr. Karl” holds degrees in physics and mathematics, biomedical engineering, medicine and surgery. He has also studied several non-degree years at various universities in astrophysics, computer science and philosophy.
Australians discovered him, however, through the media. This has been as a science writer, television presenter and radio host. On the latter alone, he speaks for about four hours every week.
His hour-long national weekly talk-back is so popular that it sometimes “crashes” the switchboard as incoming calls reach 7,000 per 15 minute window.
This is general science so the range of topics is broad. Given gardeners’ insatiable curiosity, however, this is a site well worth visiting, and often. Then there are the specifics, such as ‘Celery with Negative Calories,’ ‘Banana Fruit and Tree’ and ‘Toxic Chocolate.’ Click ‘Karl on air’ and discover how you can tune in to his broadcasts.
Bruce Zimmerman, you’ve got competition . . .
www.abc.net.au/k2/aboutkk.htm
The Encyclopedia of Life
Here’s your chance to meet Hairy a recently discovered Yeti crab. He appears on a prototype page for the newly launched Encyclopedia of Life, or EoL for short.
You can watch an encyclopedia come to life as, over the months, more and more of the world’s estimated 1.8 million living species find a place in this free, multi-language, web-based guide.
Researchers involved include those from such prestigious organizations as the Field Museum of Chicago, Harvard University, Marine Biological Laboratory, and the Smithsonian Institution. One of the full partners is the Missouri Botanical Garden which should make this an exciting site for the horticultural fraternity to use.
Initially, information will come from established scientific databases. Later, you too will be able to contribute. Gardeners will be able to add the dates their plants bloom, says James Edwards, executive director of the Washington, D.C.-based EoL. Another example would be bird watchers recording their sightings.
The EoL will function at different levels from “novice” to “expert” depending on the information desired by the visitor to the site. It is estimated that it will require a decade to list data for all 1.8 million species but the first pages should commence appearing next year.
A press release is available at
www.eol.org which goes into some detail of the background and setting up of the project.
www.eol.org
