Bryophyte Collection of Eszterházy Károly University (EGR): the digital database of peat moss (Sphagnum) species

Sass-Gyarmati, Andrea and Pénzesné Kónya, Erika and Kapi, Dávid and Stefancsik, Gergely and Kelecsényi, Fanni (2017) Bryophyte Collection of Eszterházy Károly University (EGR): the digital database of peat moss (Sphagnum) species. Acta Biologica Plantarum Agriensis, 5 (1). p. 61. ISSN 2061-6716

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Abstract

The Bryophyte Herbarium of the University of Eger (EGR) is considered to be one of the most important collections of this kind in Central Europe. Bryophyte specimens held at EGR count around 200.000 specimens, of which approximately 2700 are the Sphagnum specimens. The first Sphagnum specimens arrived probably by exchange to M. Vrabélyi from prominent botanists, as K. G. Limpricht, A. W. Evans, V. Schiffner and J. E. Zetterstedt. Imortant are the duplicate specimens collected by Á. Boros and L. Vajda (their first specimens are stored in BP). Members of the Department of Botany has also increased this part of the collection during their field research, as by: T. Pócs, J. Suba, I. Bakalár, S. Dulai and A. Vojtkó. Our main aim was to digitalize and publish first information on the cryptogam herbarium in order to provide an easier access to the data. After photographing the pages of the collection, we read the information on the photos and recorded them in an MS Excel spreadsheet. During the record process the following information could be filled: species name (Latin), section where it belongs, place of occurrence (administrative area, geographical area, coordinates), habitat, date of collection (year/month/day), substrate, name of collector and of identifier. We choose to present here our Sphagnum (peat mosses) collection as the digitization process started in 2014, and based on stage from July 2017. There are 2700 Sphagnum samples of our bryophyte collection representing around 1.35 % of the whole bryophyte collection. Among others exsiccata specimens of Sphagnotheca Borealiamericana (Ed. R. E. Andrus and D.H. Vitt). Isotype of Sphagnum amoenum Warnst. (Bryotheca brasiliensis) and isotype of Sphagnum squarrosiforme Dixon and Sherrin (Bryophytorum typorum exsiccata) are also preserved in our Sphagna collection. The most active Hungarian collectors were: Á. Boros, L. Vajda, Á. Károlyi, T. Pócs and J. Suba. In addition to this, many specimens collected by foreigners can also be found: R. E. Andrus, A. M. Cleef, J. Duda, A. Stebel, etc. There are 554 specimens from today's Hungary, most of the Hungarian specimens are from the active years of Á. Boros. The oldest Sphagnum specimen was collected by J. E. Zetterstedt in June 23, 1860 from Sweden. The collection has been growing slowly but steadily during the XIXth century. We have specimens in the collections from more than forty countries. The peat moss collection has a great floristical significance as preserves important probative specimens of bogs from which the Sphagnum species have been extinct due to the decline of the wet habitats in these days. Increasing collection activity was continuous since 2010, with completion of new data enties. It is hoped that the unified inventory of cryptogam collection will be easily searcheable facilitating loans and research.

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