• Key Plant Collections in New Zealand
• Key Animal Collections in New Zealand

KEY PLANT COLLECTIONS IN NEW ZEALAND

• Research Organisations
• Museums
• Universities
• Other

RESEARCH ORGANISATIONS

Allan Herbarium (CHR)
The Allan Herbarium contains species from around the world but specialises in indigenous and exotic plants of the New Zealand region and tropical South Pacific. It also holds specialist collections of seed, fruit, wood, plant leaf cuticle, liquid-preserved specimens, and microscope slides.
Several databases are associated with the Allan Herbarium and the Plant Biosystematics Programme, including the Plant Names Database and the specimen database, known as CHIRP. This database is not currently available on-line, but a search request can be made on-line.
More information about the Herbarium collections and databases is available from the Herbarium Database Manager.

Cawthron MicroAlgae Culture Collection
The Cawthron Institute maintains a collection of toxic algae.

ENSIS Fungal Collection
ENSIS maintains the former Forest Research Mycological Herbarium and culture collection. The Herbarium contains collections of pathogenic and saprophytic (particularly wood decaying) fungi (and a few algae and lichens) from temperate New Zealand native forests, exotic plantations and urban amenity plantings. The culture collection holds isolates of a similar range of fungi as the herbarium.

International Collection of Micro-organisms from Plants (ICMP)
Landcare Research maintains a major international collection of plant bacteria, and a repository for micro-organisms of plant and animal origin of the New Zealand Reference Culture Collection. This collection also contains cultures of the world’s bacterial and fungal plant pathogens and of other micro-organisms closely associated with plants.

New Zealand Fungal Herbarium
Landcare Research maintains a comprehensive database of New Zealand fungi, including information on names, literature, collections and attributes.

MUSEUMS

Auckland War Memorial Museum Tamaki Paenga Hira
The herbarium of the Auckland War Memorial Museum Tamaki Paenga Hira contains over 330,000 collections of all plant groups (except fungi) found naturally in New Zealand, with emphasis on the northern half of the North Island and its offshore islands. It is strong in historic collections, naturalised species and type specimens. The plant collections are more fully described on the Museum website.

The Museum's central collections database documents 198,500 plant specimens as at May 2005 and is continually being added to. Electronic records are available for the complete holdings of the New Zealand native plants and most of the naturalized ones. Active online searching is available for primary type specimens and other records will be added over time. Requests for further information can be directed to the Curator of Botany via the Museum's generic email address.

Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa
This site describes the collections held at the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, in Wellington. The herbarium contains about 250,000 collections of all plant groups except fungi from around the world, specialising in plants of the New Zealand region. It is particularly strong in historic collections, type specimens and cryptogamic plants, including marine algae.

The Museum's central collections database, KE EMu , currently documents 100,000 plant specimens or specimen lots including complete holdings of ferns, mosses, lichens, liverworts, algae, grasses and all rare and threatened seed plants. At present, the KE EMu database cannot be accessed online and requests for further information should be directed to the Collection Manager Botany via the museum's generic email address.

Otago Museum
The Otago Museum herbarium houses a number of collections including the Dunedin Field Naturalists Club Collection, a small collection of ferns and albums, and the Rawson Diatom collection. Several hundred sheets of the native plant families Apiaceae and Thymeleaceae have been acquired in recent years. The botanical collection is expanding quickly. Databases cannot be accessed online and requests for further information should be directed to the Museum’s Collections and Research Manager.

UNIVERSITIES

University Museums and Collections Online
This site provides a useful summary of all the collections held by New Zealand Universities. Contact names and addresses are provided, although some links are no longer current.

Otago Regional Herbarium (OTA)
The OTA was established in the 1950s by the Department of Botany of Otago University.

OTHER

New Zealand National Herbarium Network
Links to registered members of the New Zealand National Herbarium Network, maintained by the Department of Botany of Otago University.

Taranaki Plants
Herbarium maintained by Taranaki Regional Council.

KEY ANIMAL COLLECTIONS IN NEW ZEALAND

• Research Organisations
• Museums
• Universities
• Other

RESEARCH ORGANISATIONS

ENSIS Insect Collection
Maintained by ENSIS to assist work on forest health. Established in 1948, and now contains approximately 100,000 pinned specimens consisting mainly of forest insects and insects affecting New Zealand 's forests, plus insects discovered during quarantine inspections of imported timbers, casewood and dunnage. Formerly known as the Forest Research Insect Collection.

National Nematode Collection of New Zealand (NNCNZ)
An introduction and list of type material in the national nematode collection maintained by Landcare Research.

New Zealand Arthropod Collection (NZAC)
The New Zealand Arthropod collection (NZAC) started in Nelson in 1920 as the Cawthron Institute collection and is now maintained by Landcare Research. Databases within the collection are extensive, with contents including information on invertebrate specimens in the NZAC and species present in New Zealand, a bibliographic database of 16,000 records on New Zealand terrestrial invertebrates covering the period 1775-1993 (BUGS), and extensive information on the status of specimen collections.

National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) Biological Museum
The NIWA Invertebrate Collection holds marine invertebrates from almost all phyla found in the New Zealand region (many meiobenthic taxa not represented) plus unsorted and residue samples, collected over many years of marine taxonomic and biodiversity research in the New Zealand region, the Southwest Pacific and the Ross Sea. The collection is arranged taxonomically and holds over 100,000 containers (not all sorted to species), representing several million specimens from more than 10,000 benthic and sediment stations. The type collection contains more than 2000 type specimens, now registered in a database. One of the main products of taxonomic research is the in-house monograph series of NIWA Biodiversity Memoirs.

Further information about the collection can be obtained from the Collection Manager, Group Manager or the Science Leader. See also: NIWA Marine Biodiversity and Systematics Programme.

Virtual collection of primary types of New Zealand Hemiptera (excluding Sternorrhyncha)
Landcare Research maintains an online resource providing virtual access to the primary type specimens of Hemiptera, excluding Sternorrhycha (scale insects, aphids and allies), described from New Zealand. Current coverage includes the types of 178 Heteroptera taxa described until 2001, that have been deposited in New Zealand museums and collections.

MUSEUMS

Auckland War Memorial Museum Tamaki Paenga Hira
The collections held at the Auckland Museum Tamaki Paenga Hira cover all animal groups and include marine invertebrates (especially molluscs), marine vertebrates (mainly fish), terrestrial and freshwater invertebrates (mainly insects, spiders and molluscs), birds, mammals, reptiles and amphibians. The focus of the collections is the northern North Island and its offshore islands but there are substantial collections from across the whole of New Zealand subregion including the subantarctic islands and the Pacific. The animal collections are more fully described on the Museum website.

The Museum's collections database documents 170,000 animal specimens or specimen lots as at May 2005 and is actively being added to. Active online searching is available for primary type specimens and other records will be added over time. Requests for further information can be directed to the appropriate curatorial department via the museum's generic email address. The Museum welcomes feedback on priority groups that users would be interested in having available.

Canterbury Museum
Canterbury Museum is amongst the countries oldest scientific institutions and has been collecting and describing New Zealand's fauna since 1866. The collection contains 500,000 invertebrate and 54,000 vertebrate specimens. It holds primary types of over 1000 invertebrates and 100 vertebrates all of which have been documented in the museums journal Records of the Canterbury Museum. At present, the Canterbury Museums Collection database cannot be accessed online and requests for further information should be directed to the appropriate Collection Manager via the museum's generic email address.

Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa
The site introduces the collections held at the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa , in Wellington . Te Papa's collection includes Marine invertebrates, terrestrial invertebrates, birds, fish, mammals, reptiles and amphibians. The Museums central collections database, KE EMu, currently documents 223,000 animal specimens or specimen lots. At present, the KE EMu database cannot be accessed online and requests for further information should be directed to the appropriate Collection Manager via the museum's generic email address.

Otago Museum
The terrestrial vertebrate collection currently holds 15,000 specimens with mammals and birds being the most dominant. A representative collection of southern geckos and skinks and introduced frogs and sixty species of snakes is also held. The New Zealand mammals are principally cetacean and pinnepeds. Many of the foreign mammals in the collection are now either endangered, rare or extinct. A representative collection of all seal species found in New Zealand is held, as is a similar collection of New Zealand introduced mammals.

The terrestrial vertebrate collection currently holds 15,000 specimens with mammals and birds being the most dominant. A representative collection of southern geckos and skinks and introduced frogs and sixty species of snakes is also held. The New Zealand mammals are principally cetacean and pinnepeds. Many of the foreign mammals in the collection are now either endangered, rare or extinct. A representative collection of all seal species found in New Zealand is held, as is a similar collection of New Zealand introduced mammals.

The Otago Museum databases cannot be accessed online and requests for further information should be directed to the Museum’s Collections and Research Manager.

UNIVERSITIES

Entomology Research Museum (LUNZ)
The Entomology Research Museum is based in the Ecology and Entomology Group at Lincoln University and contains about 150,000 insect and related arthropod specimens. The Museum’s collection is made up of specimens mainly from within New Zealand, with particular emphasis on the fauna of the South Island, the South Island National Parks, the Chatham Islands and the New Zealand subantarctic islands. Specimens of agricultural and horticultural importance are also contained within the collection.

OTHER

Last revised 12/12/2006