WII Herbarium Dataset

This paper describe the herbarium dataset of the Wildlife Institute of India (WII), Dehradun, India. Altogether 4591 specimens are housed at WII herbarium, of which 4322 are digitized and published through the GBIF network. Since the inception of Wildlife Institute of India, the experts from Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) and scientists, trainees, researcher, students and herbarium staff had initiated collection of plant specimens from various protected areas distributed in all the biogeographic zones of the country. These specimens are preserved with dry preservation technique and kept in herbarium cabinets according to the Benthem & Hooker’s classification (1862-1883). The main contributors to the herbarium specimens were W.A. Rodgers, G.S. Rawat, S.S.R. Bennet, J.L. Shrivastava, Ramesh, M.M. Babu, P.L. Saklani and Parmar. The collection material is mainly utilized by the researchers and field managers from the respective protected areas of the country to prepare a checklist for Management plan. Accession of new specimens and digitization of existing ones is an ongoing process at the herbarium. It is envisaged that the herbarium will house over 2000 specimens by 2015.