Urgent Service Outage
As a result of a recent power outage, the DEC network will be unavailable for a further 8 hours so that electrical repairs can be made to damaged equipment in the DEC server room. This outage affects the site you are viewing. We apologise for any inconvenience.
The outage begins at 08:00 on Saturday, 9 August 2008 (AWST) and continues until 16:00 on Saturday, 9 August 2008 (AWST)
FloraBase News
- August PotM: Cochlospermum fraseri
1 Aug 2008 - The Kapok Bush or as it is sometimes called, the Kapok Tree, is an open tree/shrub 2–6m high, that is often leafless during its flowering period in the dry season.
- 2008 flora stats published
25 Jun 2008 - The latest authoritative stats on species names in use in WA, and a baseline count of the number of cryptogams tracked in the Census of Western Australian Plants.
- Tecticornia bibenda a 'Top 10' species
27 May 2008 - Tecticornia bibenda -- a succulent plant in WA that resembles the 'Michelin Man' -- has been recognised as one of the "Top 10" new species described in 2007.
- Why dryandras changed their name
20 May 2008 - A brief explanation of the reasoning behind the merging of Dryandra and Banksia.
- Over 800 new descriptions added
13 Mar 2008 - Since 1993, coded descriptive data has been captured and maintained for every taxon in WA. In the last year 812 queryable descriptions have been added or updated.
- Bumper year for naming new plants
7 Mar 2008 - Environment Minister notes that scientists named a record number of new species and varieties of Western Australian plants in 2007.
- Scientific Plant Names Dictionary
14 Dec 2007 - Version 2.0 of an authoritative listing to aid with the correct spelling of WA's scientific plant names within common word processing software.
- 'SoS' Nuytsia edition published
5 Dec 2007 - The Minister for Environment and Climate Change launched a special Saving our Species edition of Nuytsia in which 95 WA plants - many of which may be vulnerable to future mining activities - are scientifically named.
- Nuytsia 16(2) published
23 Nov 2007 - The final part of Nuytsia Volume 16 was published, containing ten papers and four short communications on the taxonomy of Agonis and segregates, new species and keys to Cryptandra and Stenanthemum and a review of the grass genus Puccinellia, amongst others.
- Botanical Glossary upgraded
5 Nov 2007 - The FloraBase glossary of botanical terms, first published online in v2.5 has been refined to more comprehensively link terms and referenced taxa.
- Minister launches Interactive Keys
14 Sep 2007 - The Minister for Environment and Climate Change launches our latest innovation — online identification tools — in the new FloraBase 2.5.
- New Churchill Fellow: Ray Cranfield
15 Aug 2007 - To study historical lichen collections and community participation in lichen surveys and collections - UK, Sweden.
- 2007 flora stats published
8 Jun 2007 - The latest authoritative stats on species names in use in WA, and a baseline count of the number of cryptogams tracked in the State Census.
- Nuytsia 16(1) published
20 Dec 2006 - The first part of Nuytsia Volume 16 was published on 20 December 2006. It contains twenty-two papers on the taxonomy of sections of Stylidium, Eriochilus, Goodenia and other genera including publication of the new daisy genus Rhetinocarpha.
- Science Division's Database Server upgraded
6 Oct 2006 - The database server upgrade of Tuesday 3 October has been successful, and a number of minor issues corrected subsequently.
- New Herbarium Curator
6 Oct 2006 - Dr Kevin Thiele began duties as the new head of the WA Herbarium on Wednesday 4 October 2006.
- New version of FloraBase released
21 Sep 2006 - Version 2.1.3, released today contains a significant upgrade to the usability of plant names currency information, and improved browser compatibility for the new Phylogeny Browser.
- Phylogeny Browser now available
1 Aug 2006 - A new interactive tool for the exploration of relationships between orders and families of flowering plants, with links to FloraBase genera and species and three authoritative external sites.
- 2006 Flora Statistics published
1 Jun 2006 - The latest authoritative stats on species names in use in WA, and for the first time a baseline count of the number of cryptogams tracked in the State Census.
- WA Plant Census List released
14 Feb 2006 - The latest update to the Census of Western Australian Plants contains 19,729 species-level records and 828 family records, including significant numbers of new entries for the algae, bryophyte and lichen flora.
- Major new revision of Senecio
8 Feb 2006 - Seven newly recognised species and four new subspecies of Western Australian Senecio have recently been described.
- 14000 species descriptions reached
2 Feb 2006 - Since 1993 taxonomic descriptions of Western Australia's vascular flora have been captured and maintained in a sophisticated standards-based database environment and provides simple interactive identification in FloraBase.
- 49 specimen updates in WAHERB
17 Jan 2006 - 49 herbarium specimens were examined by specialists and were re-determined or had their taxonomic identity confirmed.
- 114 WA plants published in 2004
16 Jan 2006 - 114 new or recircumscribed WA plant taxa were documented in scientific journals during 2004, including 34 conservation taxa.
- Marine Plants Project launch
20 Dec 2005 - The innovative Marine Plants Project was offically launched by the Minister for the Environment. It provides ready access to authoritative current names for WAs 1,000 marine species and access to some 20,000 specimens.
- Further new taxa in Dryandra
16 Dec 2005 - Six new taxa in the endemic WA genus Dryandra published by A.S. George in the journal Nuytsia, including one new species and five subspecies and varieties.
- Nuytsia 15(3) published
16 Dec 2005 - The final part of Nuytsia Volume 15 was published on 16 December 2005. It contains fourteen papers on the taxonomy of sections of Drosera, Dryandra, Eucalyptus and other genera including publication of the new myrtaceous genus Astus.
- Five years of Woodland Watch
8 Dec 2005 - A project to restore and protect the Wheatbelts eroded bush has found even the most degraded land to be rich with previously undiscovered species.
