Launch CD-ROM Orchids New Guinea (Part 6)
During the official opening of the Orchiade in the Leiden Botanic Garden on april 1st, part 6 in the CD-ROM series Flora Malesiana. Orchids of New Guinea, Genus Bulbophyllum will be published and presented to Sara Oldfield, Secretary General of Botanic Gardens Conservation International and a few invitees. This is the last part of a series in which all of the c. 3000 known orchid species of New Guinea have been treated in an interactive digital information system. This is the second substantial publication within the framework of the recently founded NCB Naturalis and in fact the first electronic one.
-
The publication appears exactly 100 years after the publication of Schlechter’s first part of Die Orchidaceen von Deutsch Neu Guinea, which treats 1100 species. It is with great satisfaction that this publication coincides with the Year of Biodiversity. The project started in 1996 with a pilot which resulted in a Demo CD-ROM. In 1998 substantial funding has been acquired which continued up to 2009: the project mostly had to depend on external funding. The parts are comprised as follows: Vol 1: Checklist (2001), Vol 2: Dendrobium and allied genera, 560 soorten (2002), Vol. 3: Acanthephippium to Hymenorchis (excluding Dendobiinae s.l.), 673 species (2005), Vol. 4: Kuhlhasseltia to Ophioglossella, c. 400 soorten(2006), Vol. 5: Pachystoma to Zeuxine, c. 480 species (2008) en Vol. 6: Bulbophyllum, 635 species (2010). For more information please look here
The project has been carried out in collaboration with the National Capital Botanic Gardens Port Moresby (Papua New Guinea), and with cooperation of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and Botanic Garden, Edinburgh (UK). For this publication a number of 1-month field trips were carried out in Papua (Indonesië) (altogether 3), and Papua New Guinea (altogether 12) by one or several research staff members of the Leiden University. As a result c. 4500 live specimens were collected and have been cultivated by the dedicated staff of the Leiden Botanic Garden. From these specimens a number of new taxa have been described based on spirit and dry herbarium material and more will follow. Among the new taxa are Bulbophyllum tindemansianum and B. dijkstallianum which on January 28th on the occasion of the official opening of NCB Naturalis and the UN Year of Biodiversity (2010) have been presented to Hans Dijkstal and Peter Tindemans.
