2018-08-20

Record information about the existence of the specimen as it was collected in a particular place at a particular time. 

Spell out abbreviations and acronyms and include the abbreviation in parenthesis the first time the abbreviated phrase is used. The abbreviation can be used in subsequent sentences.

Do not include HTML markup.

Provide three to five subject headings for each specimen. Source terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH).

1. All specimens should be assigned the subject headings “Herbaria” and “Plants--Canada, Eastern.”
2. The third subject heading should refer to the specific plant, as closely as possible. 
   1. To find this subject heading, start by searching the genus (dwc.genus) in LCSH.
      1. For example, for a specimen with the scientific name Asclepias incarnata L. var. pulchra (Erh.) Pers., search Asclepias.
      2. Asclepias is a variant name of the subject Milkweeds, so use Milkweeds as the subject heading.
      3. Narrower terms of Milkweeds include Bloodflower, Common milkweed, Curtiss’ milkweed, and Wheel milkweed, but the specific type of milkweed here, Asclepias incarnata (Swamp milkweed), is not a subject term in LCSH.
   2. For some specimens, this level of specificity is possible, e.g., for Acer saccharum Marsh, use Sugar maple (variant term Acer saccharum).
   3. For other specimens, it is necessary to resort to the plant family name (dwc.family), because the genus is not a subject term in LCSH.
      1. For example, for Lapsana communis L. (Nippleworts), the genus Lapsana is not an LCSH term, but its family name, Compositae, is, so use Compositae as the third subject term.

Use a new dc.subject field for each subject heading.

Herbaria

Plants–Canada, Eastern

Botanical specimens

Fungi

Lichen

Yes

Record the latest ordinal day of the year on which the Event occurred (1 for January 1; 365 for December 31, except in a leap year, in which case it is 366).

The Excel template uses a DATE formula to generate the ordinal day of the year.

=B4-DATE(YEAR(B4),1,0)

1943

1966-05

1985-09-22

Yes

Record the date-time during which the specimen was collected or observed. Recommended best practice is to use an encoding scheme, such as ISO 8601-1:2019 and ISO 8601-2:2019. See Library of Congress Extended Date-Time Format for guidance and examples.

Specific guidance for DalSpace includes:

• Use the "extended format" specified in ISO 8601: hyphen between calendar components and colon between clock components (e.g., 2005-09-24T10:00:00).
  
  
• Use Level 0 complete representation whenever possible (e.g., 1934-05-18)
  
  
• Use Level 0 reduced precision for year and month (e.g., 1934-05 not 1934-05-XX). 
  
  
• Use Level 0 reduced precision for year (e.g., 1934 not 1934-XX-XX).
  
  
• Use Level 1 rules for qualifying uncertain or approximate dates. Use the character '?' to qualify an uncertain date and the '~' character to qualify an approximate date. Do not use the '%' character to qualify an uncertain and approximate date.
  
  
• Use the character 'X' in place of rightmost digits when recording a year-only expression (e.g., 193X not 193X-XX-XX).
  
  
• Use the character 'X', anywhere in the component only when the specimen has a precise month and day but the year is unspecified (e.g., 19XX-05-08). Do not provide dwc.day or dwc.startDayOfYear when the year is unspecified.
  
  
  • Alternate approach is to record an unspecified year (e.g., 19XX) and provide the month and day in an eventRemarks note (e.g., Specimen collected on May 8, sometime within the 20th century).
    
    
• Use the character '/' to denote intervals.
  
  
• Only record uncertain intervals if the uncertain or approximate dates fall within a twenty year range.

1943

1966-05

1985-09-22

19XX-05-08

If field notes are known to exist in the Dalhousie University Archives or another repository, record a reference to the notes. Include a unique identifier or call number if applicable. 

If the specimen was collected by Hugh Bell (see dwc.recordedBy field), check the diaries (1932-1934, 1943-1956) and catalogue (1950) in the Hugh Bell fonds (MS-2-798) for references to the specimen, using the date entered in dwc.eventDate. If the specimen is mentioned by name (either scientific or vernacular), reference the diary, date, and page number, and quote the relevant section in dwc.fieldNotes. Sometimes the reference will be part of a prose entry and sometimes the specimen will be included in a list. Specimens collected in 1950 are often included in both his diary for 1949-1950 and in the catalogue for 1950; reference both sources. If the specimen was collected by Bell but no reference to it is made in his diaries or catalogue, do not enter anything in the field notes.

[Specimen mentioned in prose]: See Hugh Bell's notebook from plant collecting trips in and around Halifax, Nova Scotia (1945-1946), MS-2-798, SF Box 87, Folder 4, Hugh Phillip Bell fonds, Dalhousie University Archives. This specimen is mentioned in his entry for Thursday, September 12, 1946 (pp. 51-52): "Shirley found two sand flowers of which we made collections."

[Specimen included in a list]: See Hugh Bell's notebook from plant collecting trips in and around Halifax, Nova Scotia (1947-1948), MS-2-798, SF Box 87, Folder 5, Hugh Phillip Bell fonds, Dalhousie University Archives. Bell lists the Suaeda maritima in his entry for August 18, 1947 (pp. 31-33).

[Specimen collected in 1950]: See Hugh Bell's notebook from plant collecting trips in and around Halifax, Nova Scotia (1949-1951), MS-2-798, SF Box 87, Folder 6, Hugh Phillip Bell fonds, Dalhousie University Archives. His entry for July 14, 1950 (pp. 73-76) lists the Apocynum androsaemifolium sample, collected from "Erskine's collecting spots", shown to Bell, Anne Graham, and Ann Marshall by Erskine on June 5, 1950. The specimen is also listed on p. 47 of Bell's 1950 catalogue (see MS-2-798, SF Box 87, Folder 9, Hugh Phillip Bell fonds, Dalhousie University Archives). This entry specifies that the specimen was collected from a weed in an orchard in New Canaan, King's County.

dwc.georeferencedDate

http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/georeferencedDate

Yes

Record the date on which the Location was georeferenced. Recommended best practice is to use an encoding scheme, such as ISO 8601-1:2019.

2018-07-18

dwc.georeferenceProtocol

http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/georeferenceProtocol

Yes

If the specimen is georeferenced using a standardized geographic place access point, provide a reference to the Dalhousie Libraries' documentation on creating geographic place access points. Use the APA Style Guide, 6th Edition. 

Dalhousie Libraries. (2019).University Archives procedure manual, Procedures for creating geographic place access points. Retrieved from Create a geographic place access point.

Yes

Provide references to maps, gazetteers, or other resources used to georeference the locality, described specifically enough to allow anyone in the future to use the same resources. Use APA Style Guide (6th ed) to format references. If multiple sources were used, provide references to each sources.

When preparing CSV data for bulk import, the recommended best practice is to separate the values into multiple columns (e.g., dwc.georeferenceSources_1, dwc.georeferenceSources_2).

National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. (n.d.). GeoNames WMS Viewer. Available from http://geonames.nga.mil/namesviewer/default.asp.

Natural Resources Canada. (n.d.). Canadian Geographic Names Database. Available from http://www4.rncan.gc.ca/search-place-names/search?lang=en.

U.S. Geological Survey. (n.d.). Earth Explorer. Available from https://earthexplorer.usgs.gov/.

Provide citations to each reference used in the identification.

Interagency Taxonomy Steering Committee. (n.d.). Integrated Taxonomic Information System online database. Retrieved from http://www.itis.gov.

The Plant List online database, http://www.theplantlist.org.

dwc.identificationRemarks

Classification verified by Sophie Tattrie on May 14, 2018. Verification based on Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS) and the Plant List.

Record a standardized form of place information provided in dwc.verbatimLocality. If the verbatim locality references a town, village, or city, search for this location in the places taxonomy in the Archives Catalogue. For instance, if the verbatim locality is “Skerry's Brook, Waverley, Halifax Co., N.S.”, search the places taxonomy for “Waverley”. If the locality is already included in the places taxonomy, transcribe the standardized name of the location (i.e., Waverley (N.S.)) into the dwc.locality field. Copy the latitude and longitude (written as latitude, longitude in AtoM) into the dwc.decimalLatitude and dwc.decimalLongitude fields.

If the verbatim locality does not reference a town, village, or city, use the smallest geographic unit (e.g., river, lake, or county). For example, for “Eden Lake, Pictou Co., N.S.” use Eden Lake (N.S.).

If a standardized form of place is not already included in the places taxonomy, find the location in one of the following geographic names databases and add the location to the places taxonomy:

• For Canadian locations: Natural Resources Canada. "Canadian Geographic Names Database." http://www4.rncan.gc.ca/search-place-names/search?lang=en.
• For American locations: U.S. Geological Survey. "Earth Explorer." https://earthexplorer.usgs.gov/.
• For other locations: National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. "GeoNames WMS Viewer." http://geonames.nga.mil/namesviewer/default.asp.

Add a new location to the places taxonomy. See instructions in the University Archives Procedure Manual.

Aberdeen (Scotland)

Dartmouth (N.S.)

Rio de Janeiro (Brazil)

Provide a list (concatenated and separated) of preparations and preservation methods used, if the specimen was treated or conserved during processing and digitization activities. If multiple methods are used, the recommended best practice is to separate the values with a vertical bar (' | ').

Provide a list (concatenated and separated) of names of people, groups, or organizations responsible for recording the original Occurrence. If the name is unknown, record "Unknown."

If multiple persons or groups were involved, the recommended best practice is to separate the values with a vertical bar (' | '). The primary collector or observer, especially one who applies a personal identifier (recordNumber), should be listed first. 

Record personal names in the format of Lastname, Firstname

Record corporate names using the form of name most commonly used to identify the corporate body. In most cases, this should not be an abbreviation.