University of Puerto Rico Herbario, Mayaguez

The MAPR herbarium is situated on the west coast of the island of Puerto Rico, Mayagüez. The herbarium, founded in 1958 has collections from throughout the main island, Cuba and Hispaniola. It has particularly rich collections from Western Puerto Rico and the islands of the Mona Straights (Desecheo, Mona and Monito). The bryophytes are also well represented including collections from most of Latin America. The MAPR herbarium is an institutional member of the Red de Herbarios de Mesoamérica y el Caribe.

A project is now underway at the MAPR herbarium to assemble the existing collections ( c.25,000) into a BRAHMS Database. To assist, funds have been raised from the US Fish and Wildlife Service and The University of Puerto Rico. Prior to collection entry, the database was primed with some 4000 gazetteer entries from the US Geological Service data set. Draft lists of vascular plant, moss and hepatic species names for the Island were also fed into the database.

As well as providing an efficient curatorial infrastructure, the database project is being undertaken to help identify critical habitat areas and individual species in need of protection.

Materials contributed by University of Puerto Rico Herbario, Mayaguez (MAPR):

• Specimens