Premium
THE CONSTRUCTION OF A FLORISTIC DATABASE
Author(s) -
Pankhurst R. J.
Publication year - 1983
Publication title -
taxon
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.819
H-Index - 81
eISSN - 1996-8175
pISSN - 0040-0262
DOI - 10.2307/1221971
Subject(s) - floristics , taxon , flora (microbiology) , scheme (mathematics) , geography , database , computer science , ecology , information retrieval , biology , mathematics , paleontology , mathematical analysis , bacteria
Summary Several substantial databases exist for monographic data but little progress has been made towards floristic databases. For the latter, a scheme for comparable description of diverse taxa is needed. The creation and use of such a scheme is described here, with a pilot database constructed from representatives of the families in the flora of Great Britain. It is possible for data on taxa to be collected efficiently using a questionnaire program, hence avoiding the problem of having to search long lists of characters from which only a few can be recorded. It appears that the approach is practical and may lead to a new kind of standard for taxonomic descriptions.