2. Heteroptera: True Bugs 7 infraorders 85 families 40,000 described species

3. Miridae: Plant Bugs 1,300 valid genera 10,000 valid species mostly phytophagous and host specific

4. PBI Target Taxa: Orthotylinae & Phylinae 486 described genera 90 new genera 3905 described species 1200 new species Monophyletic; worldwide

5. Exemplar Orthotylinae & Phylinae

6. Species Accumulation Curves

7. Plant Bug PBI Individual Participants 4 senior scientists 4 postdoctoral trainees 2 doctoral trainees 2 research assistants 3 undergraduate trainees IT support staff

15. PBI Database Goals 650,000 total specimens 100,000 specimens from 15 PBI-supported field trips 3500 host plant specimens

16. Acquisition of Collections

17. Appeal for Specimens To improve taxonomic coverage To improve geographic coverage To improve host documentation Please contact me during the conference or via email at: schuh@amnh.org

18. Australian Miridae: changes from 1995--2004 +10% 210 described species: +10% +750% 1,500 predicted spp.: +750% +4000% 1,400 recorded hosts: +4000% +300 % 75,000 specimens: +300 %

19. South African Collecting and museum visits, October 2004 + 700% ~15,000 specimens: + 700% + 150% ~250 species: + 150% + 300% ~200 new hosts: + 300%

20. Processing of Collections Insects Mounting & labeling centralized in AMNH New York Rough sorting centralized in AMNH Host plants Vouchers identified by specialists Vouchers deposited in recognized herbaria

21. Processing of Collections Management of Taxonomic activities distributed by group Phylinae: American Museum Orthotylinae: Australian Museum

22. Creating Specimen Database Software Choices Use off the shelf product Develop specialized application Platform Approaches Browser-based data entry Open source programs – MySQL Database Engine

23. Browser based Data entry on local machines Upload to web server Minimize fields Maximize efficiency Multiple Modes Museum Mode Field Mode Specimen Database Concept

25. Field Mode: Locality Data

26. Field Mode: Host Data

27. GEOLocate Stand alone program Easy to use Individual & batch processing Manual correction capability Limitations – parsing of locality names – still under development http://www.museum.tulane.edu/geolocate/default.aspx Georeferencing

30. Is it necessary? Machine readability Bar codes Matrix codes Alpha-numeric readability Unique Specimen Identification

34. Web Presentation of Taxonomic Information

35. Tracking progress of specimen processing Management of host identification and vouchering Coordination of data entry and unique specimen identification Effective and efficient geocoding Summary - Hurdles

36. 20 % increase in total specimens 20 % increase in known diversity increase in geographic coverage dramatic increase in host- documented specimens dramatic increase in host vouchers Summary - Accomplishments

37. Sheridan Hewson-Smith Steve Thurston Other PBI project participants & collaborators National Science Foundation American Museum of Natural History Australian Museum Acknowledgements