AN INTRODUCTION TO FIELD BOTANY
(first draft)
What is field botany?
What a Field Botanist Should Know
A Note about References Manuals
What about the Field Guides
General Rules of Thumb for Field Botanists
Where Can I Learn About the Methods Used by Field Botanists?
What is Field Botany?
Field botany is an interesting field, one that people often become passionate about. It involves the study of plant species in the field, where they are found, why they are found there, and where else they might occurr. Focus is on field work and collecting, and gaining an understanding of the ecological dynamics of plant species, and on microscopic work for certainty in identification. One of the fun things in field botany is hunting for plants, checking predicted or expected areas for plant occurences, and, best of all, finding new (and sometimes unexpected) locations for species--or even species new to the region. The nformation collected by a field botanists is important for the development of regional floras, and for understanding the staus of a species--it is common or rare? . Anyone can be a field botanist--professors, taxonomists, naturalists--it's really all about what you learn and how you go about it, and building up a knowledge-base.. Going about it scientifically, and with taxonomic accuracy, is important.
What a Field Botanist Should Know
The skills and expertise that are required to be a 'field botanist' can be partially learned in university, but much of the knowledge is gained by self-learning, by learning about the plants in the field and about the flora of a region. This includes learning through experience how common species are, how abundant they are, and what habitats you can expect to find them in. Field botany is also about procedures and tools, the things a botanist needs to know in order to document their work. These fall into four categories:
An experienced field botanist brings these four areas of knowledge and skills to any floristic work they undertake. They know the flora fairly well, enough to know when a plant they encounter is new and might be rare. They know enough about plant ecology to have insight into the ecological requirements of a species, incluing its light and moisture requirements, its population needs, general dispersal mechanisms, and things/actions that will threaten its existence--these things can offer clues as to where else a species may occur. They also know enough about plant taxonomy to know that field identification of a species often isn't enough--that collections often have to be looked at under a microscope to make a final species determination and rule out similar-looking species. And, lastly, they know the importance of taking voucher specimens to document and verify their finds. Each of these--knowledge of the flora, knowledge of plant ecology, knowledge of plant taxonomy, and knowlege of the methods needed to do viable work--is critical to doing acceptable field botany work in a professional and scientifically sound way.
For many field botanists, this knowledge base is picked up through botany courses at university. But some of this knowledge--and perhaps the most critical component-- is picked up through cumulative learning. This is knowledge of the flora.
A good field botanist knows the flora, or works towards becoming familiar with it. . This is knowledge that can't be gained through universities and requires dedicated study and collection of regional plants so that familiarity with the regional diversity of species is built up. There is no substitute for plant collecting, specimen identification and use of herbarium collections to help solidify an ID. This is essential learning that any good field botanist brings to the work. They know that in any study of the local flora, there is homework to do, and that a key component of this is working through collections in herbaria.
Knowledge of the flora also necessarily means knowledge of methods, for the only way to learn about a regional flora (at least, once you are familiar with the most common species) is to collect and process specimens that can be looked at in the lab, where detailed floras (books that are detailed and specific about local plant composition) and identification manuals, along with specimens, are used to gain a firm identification.Through this, we learn that there might be, for example, six similar species, and that sorting them out might depend on the shape of the beak on the achene/seed, or on the shape or length of the stigma. Expert identification (one that rules out similar species) is made by using techinical manuals. Field botanists work with taxonomic keys that are written specifically for a region, and that outline all of the variation in species likely to be encountered. By working through a key, we can arrive at the correct species, and rule out the others.
A Note About Reference Manuals
In our region, field botanists start with two main references sources: the Illustrated Flora of British Columbia (a six volume series by Douglas et al.), and the Flora of the Pacific Norhwest (by Hitchcock). They may also work with the Jepson Manual: Higher Plants of California (edited by Jepson), which covers plant species along the Pacific Coast that distributionally make it into British Columbia. Floras from adjacent region can also be helpful, especially those from Alaska and Washington, where there is considerable overlap in species.
Additionally, field botanists in our region work with E-Flora BC. E-Flora brings the Illustrated Flora of BC online and allows a quick way to learn which species are found in your region and the status of the species in BC and elsewhere. E-Flora provides a substantial beginning on developing a knowledge base for a species. Examine the distribution maps, which are based on specimen collections, to learn how common or rare a species is.
But E-Flora is only a starting point and use should always be followed up by working through the techincal manuals and looking at herbarium specimens.
What about the field guides?
Field guides are useful for getting in the ball park. They can help you discover that the plant you are looking at is a buttercup, not a yellow poppy, or a lupine, not a delphinium. But the expert field botanist must go further than that in order to ensure proper identification and a review of all possible similar species.
General Rules of Thumb for Field Botanists
Where can I learn about the methods used by field botanists?
For those wishing to learn more about field botany methods and approaches, key guidelines for standard proceures were prepared by the BC Ministry of Environment (formerly Environmeent, Lands and Parks) for the provincial Resources Inventory Committee. These are things that every experienced field botanists should know. For resource managers, these are the requirements for field botany work that should be included in contract requirements for the province. The guidelines may be accessed at:
Voucher Specimen Collection, Preparation, Identification and Storage Protocol: Plants and Fungi
From this site, the following links are useful and recommended reading. They provide guidance on the need for vouchering, how to voucher, how to record data so that it is useful, the type of data which is ideal, and more:
Vascular and Non-vascular Plants
References
Douglas et al. (list volumes)
Hitchcock
Jepson
Recommended citation: Author, date, page title. In: Klinkenberg, Brian. (Editor) 2021. E-Flora BC: Electronic Atlas of the Flora of British Columbia [eflora.bc.ca]. Lab for Advanced Spatial Analysis, Department of Geography, University of British Columbia, Vancouver. [Date Accessed]
E-Flora BC: An initiative of the Spatial Data Lab, Department of Geography UBC, and the UBC Herbarium.
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