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| Herbarium Pacificum | |
|---|---|
| Name | Herbarium Pacificum |
| Established | 1920s |
| Location | Honolulu, Hawaii |
| Type | Herbarium |
| Collections | Pacific and Asian plant specimens |
| Director | Curatorial staff of the Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum |
Herbarium Pacificum Herbarium Pacificum is the botanical collection housed at the Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum in Honolulu, Hawaii. The collection documents floristic diversity across the Pacific Ocean, including specimen material from the Hawaiian Islands, Polynesia, Micronesia, Melanesia, Southeast Asia, and parts of the West Pacific. As a regional center of botanical curation, the Herbarium Pacificum supports comparative floristics, biogeography, conservation assessments, and taxonomic revisions for Pacific and adjacent Asian taxa.
The Herbarium Pacificum traces roots to early collecting by figures associated with the Royal Hawaiian Agricultural Society, the Hawaiian Kingdom court, and missionaries such as William Ellis (missionary) and Hiram Bingham I. Specimens accumulated during 19th-century voyages by USS expeditions and naturalists including Charles Darwin-era collectors, visits by the U.S. Exploring Expedition (Wilkes Expedition), and botanical surveys linked to the Hawaiian Sugar Planters' Association. Institutional consolidation occurred under the Bishop Museum after its founding by Charles Reed Bishop and Bernice Pauahi Bishop, with curatorial growth influenced by botanists like Joseph Rock, David Frederik Ricker, and researchers tied to the United States Department of Agriculture. The 20th century saw expansion through regional expeditions, wartime movements involving the United States Navy, and postwar collaborations with Pacific governments such as the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands and the Republic of the Marshall Islands.
The Herbarium Pacificum houses tens of thousands of specimens representing families and genera collected across island groups and continental margins, with strengths in native Hawaiian endemics, Pacific pteridophytes, and Polynesian ethnobotanical taxa. Notable collections include material associated with collectors like Joseph Rock, Harold L. Lyon, Charles N. Forbes, and field series from expeditions sponsored by National Geographic Society, the Smithsonian Institution, and the California Academy of Sciences. Holdings encompass type specimens cited in monographs by authors affiliated with Kew Gardens (Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew), taxonomic treatments from the Flora of the Hawaiian Islands initiatives, and voucher specimens used in molecular studies by laboratories at University of Hawaii at Manoa, University of California, Berkeley, and Harvard University Herbaria. Geographic coverage spans Oahu, Maui, Kauai, Big Island of Hawaii, Samoa, Tonga, Fiji, Guam, Palau, New Caledonia, Vanuatu, Philippines, and Indonesia.
Research tied to the Herbarium Pacificum has produced floristic checklists, taxonomic revisions, and conservation assessments published in outlets associated with the Bishop Museum Occasional Papers, the Journal of the Arnold Arboretum, and the Pacific Science journal. Curators and associated botanists have contributed to regional syntheses such as the Flora Malesiana project, revisions of genera in the Asteraceae and Fabaceae families, and molecular phylogenies published in journals like Systematic Botany and Taxon. Collaborative publications with researchers from Smithsonian Institution, Australian National Herbarium, National Tropical Botanical Garden, Cornell University, and University of California, Davis have addressed invasive species management, restoration ecology on Kahoolawe, and island speciation patterns influenced by events like Voyage of the HMS Challenger-era collections. Type descriptions deposited in the Herbarium Pacificum have been cited in global databases curated by institutions such as Global Biodiversity Information Facility and regional checklists maintained by Pacific Island Ecosystems at Risk.
Physical facilities for curatorial work are integrated within the Bishop Museum complex, featuring climate-controlled cabinets, a specimen preparation laboratory, and molecular sampling cold storage supporting DNA-grade tissue preservation. The Herbarium Pacificum has engaged in digitization initiatives consistent with standards promoted by the Consortium of Pacific Herbaria and partnered with the Biodiversity Heritage Library to increase accessibility of historic literature associated with collections. Digitized specimen data and high-resolution images have been contributed to aggregators including the Global Biodiversity Information Facility, the Integrated Digitized Biocollections network, and institutional portals maintained by the Bishop Museum. Digitization efforts have followed best practices established by the Natural History Museum, London and the New York Botanical Garden to enable remote taxonomic verification and georeferencing aligned with protocols developed by the Atlas of Living Australia.
Public-facing programs leverage the Herbarium Pacificum to support exhibitions at the Bishop Museum and educational partnerships with institutions such as the University of Hawaii at Manoa and local K–12 schools. Outreach includes workshops for herbarium techniques offered with the Hawai‘i Inventory of Native Species teams, community science projects with the Native Hawaiian Plant Society, and interpretive displays tied to cultural collections highlighting plant uses documented by anthropologists associated with the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology and ethnobotanists from Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. Internships and training opportunities engage students from Kapiʻolani Community College, Hawaii Pacific University, and international fellows supported by grants from organizations like the National Science Foundation and the National Geographic Society.
The Herbarium Pacificum maintains collaborations with regional and global partners including the University of Hawaii System, Smithsonian Institution, Kew Gardens, the National Tropical Botanical Garden, the Australian National Herbarium, and Pacific government agencies such as the Office of Hawaiian Affairs. Cooperative projects address biodiversity inventories funded through programs administered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, capacity-building supported by the United Nations Development Programme, and specimen repatriation discussions involving indigenous stewardship groups. Research networks linking the Herbarium Pacificum, the Consortium of Pacific Herbaria, and university herbaria in California, Washington (state), and New Zealand facilitate specimen loans, joint field expeditions, and coordinated responses to threats such as invasive plants and habitat loss.
Category:Herbaria Category:Bernice P. Bishop Museum Category:Botanical research in Oceania