2008 Alaska Park Science Symposium
October 14, 2008
Recent Notable Floristic Records from Northwestern Alaska
Carolyn L. Parker1, Steffi Ickert-Bond2
1University of Alaska Museum of the North Herbarium, P.O. Box 756960, Fairbanks, AK, 99775, USA, Phone 907-474-7109, Fax 907-474-1987, fnclp1@uaf.edu
2University of Alaska Museum of the North Herbarium, Dept. of Biology and Wildlife, University of Alaska Fairbanks, 907 Yukon Drive, Fairbanks, AK, 99775-6960, USA, Phone 907-474-6277, steffi.ickertbond@uaf.edu
Botanical surveys in northwestern Alaska, including NPS-I&M Arctic Network Parklands inventories, have made several significant contributions to our baseline knowledge of the regional flora. Three species new to science have been described and published: Parrya nauruaq, Primula anvilensis, and Douglasia beringensis. The occurrence of six species, previously known only from the Russian Far East and westward, have been documented in northwestern Alaska: Potentilla fragiformis, Ranunculus monophyllus, Saussurea triangulata, Hierochloe annulata, Calamagrostis tenuis, and Kobresia filifolia ssp. subfilifolia. Furthermore, major westward and northward range extensions have been documented for several species linking northwestern Alaska with the circumpolar high arctic (Draba pauciflora), the Canadian arctic (Festuca edlundiae and X_Dupoa labradorica), and with the endemic-rich East Beringia region (Oxytropis tananensis, Lupinus kuschei, Symphyotrichum yukonense, Carex deflexa, Eriophorum viridicarinatum, and Schizachne purpurascens).
The University of Alaska Museum of the North Herbarium (ALA) database is now accessible over the internet (http://arctos.database.museum/home.cfm). This resource includes translated (Russian to English) label data for our Chukotka collections, a project funded by the NPS-Shared Beringian Heritage Program, and a link to a worldwide mapping program. Therefore all our vascular specimen records, including these new findings and the results of the recent NPS-I&M inventories throughout Alaska, are readily available on-line. Many specimens are already linked to high-resolution herbarium specimen images, and an imaging project that will include all ALA specimens continues.
Future botanical inventory efforts on both sides of the Bering Strait will certainly yield additional new records and an increased understanding of the rich floristic Beringian heritage we share.
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