Claude E Phillips Herbarium
What is a herbarium?
A
herbarium is a collection of preserved plant specimens.
These specimens may be whole plants or plant parts; these
will usually be in a dried form, mounted on a sheet. Other
ways of preserving plants are through using alcohol or some
other preservative. Delaware State University is home to
the 87th
largest herbarium in the U.S. out of approximately 525 and
the largest herbarium at an HBCU!
How
do you preserve a plant?
To preserve their form and color, plants collected in the
field are spread flat on sheets of newsprint and dried,
usually in a plant press. The specimens, which are then
mounted on sheets of stiff white paper, are labeled with
all pertinent data, such as collector, date, location,
color of the flowers and/or foliage, altitude, and special
habitat conditions.
Detailed information is absolutely required for future
researchers!
Why
do we have herbaria?
Herbaria are essential for the study of plant taxonomy,
plant geography, and many other related fields. Herbaria
also help to identify weeds, poisonous plants, contaminants
in food and medicine, and other plants or plant parts
important to the U.S. economy. Thus, it is important to
include as much of the plant as possible (e.g., flowers,
stems, leaves, fruit) to prepare a proper herbarium
specimen.
Click on the link below to see a guide on perserving plant
specimens.
herbarium.pdf