The Herbarium

The Arboretum herbarium houses more than 165,000 dried plant specimens and 19,000 lichens, many from Illinois and Missouri. The herbarium's strongest collections are its (1) active and nearly comprehensive contemporary collection of the flora of the 24-county Chicago region and (2) broad collection of woody plants of the northern Temperate zone, both cultivated and spontaneous. Our Chicago region collections are available online through vPlants, and we have recently secured funding through IMLS to develop an online portal for the remaining collections. Other important collections include:

Integrated Plant Collections Database

The herbarium is beginning, in fall of 2008, a two-year collaboration with the living collections department funded by a grant from the Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS) to develop an integrated plant collections database. The database will link all plants data in the herbarium and living collections, improving the accuracy of plant names and establishing institutional consistency in plant nomenclature. Furthermore, the database will create a unified framework in which to store all current and future data related to the arboretum's plant collections, including links between data tables, tools for curating the plant collections, and a public Web interface.

Herbarium opportunities

The herbarium depends on our more than 30 active volunteers, who collect plants, mount specimens, file and accession, make labels, enter data, develop databases and aid in nomenclatural research, and assist in many other tasks. The herbarium is a lively and enjoyable place to work. If you are interested in volunteering with us, you can contact Andrew Hipp, Plant Systematist and Herbarium Curator, or Jason Sturner, Herbarium Assistant, to discuss possibilities.