Cleveland M

useum of N

atural H

istory Digital Tour

A glim

pse inside the Invertebrate Zoology bee collections

Carlyn M

itchell, Laboratory Technician, Cleveland M

useum of N

atural History.

cmitch32@

kent.edu

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●First C

leveland natural history collections w

ere assembled in

the 1830s by a small, inform

al team

of naturalists.

●A

fter its inception in 1920, C

MN

H has now

become

home to m

ore than five million

specimens and artifacts.

Case H

all, where the original collections w

ere eventually relocated to.

Photo from

Special C

ollections, Cleveland S

tate U

niversity Library.

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Norm

ally a com

pilation of sm

all and large donations from

universities, researchers, and private collectors.

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Donations norm

ally come w

ith specimen data attached but can

sometim

es require special attention to improve their value.

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�Dichotom

ous Keys, Voucher

Specimens.

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Historical m

useum collections offer a cache of invaluable specim

en data.

●M

uch of these resources are not readily accessible through digital m

eans.

●In order to address this issue, the N

SF began offering annual

grants aimed at digitizing and im

aging major m

useum collections.

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●In 2014, C

MN

H and five other m

ajor museum

s collaborated under one of these N

SF TC

N grants to digitize the data of >2

million arthropod and m

ollusk specimens.

-Operating in O

H, II, A

L, MI, D

E, and P

A

●O

nce complete, all specim

en data can be accessed through →

iDigB

io.org

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Over 100,000 invertebrate specim

ens to digitize.-P

erformed prim

arily by trained students and volunteers.

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●100,000 specim

ens curated as of March!

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Curating and digitizing the bees began as a m

eans to expand upon an N

SF TC

N grant and to im

prove the quality of the collection.-K

irtlandia Adopt-a-student research internship.

●P

roject was also m

ade possible through the donation of voucher specim

ens from D

r. Sam

Droege.

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Using dichotom

ous keys and voucher specimens, bum

ble bee identities w

ere either fixed, corroborated, or newly ascertained.

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bus IRU�PLOHV

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ver 25% of the total bee collections are %

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●R

oughly 50% of those

bumbles of B

ombus

impatiens.

●The other half com

prised of 28 different E

astern and W

estern species.

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●C

urrently, 893 B

umbles accounted

for.→

29 different species of B

ombus, including:

-Bom

bus affinis-B

ombus terricola

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Once B

ombus w

as curated and digitized, project w

as expanded to include the other 2,500+ bee specim

ens in the collection.

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●H

ow specim

ens are stored →

Ethanol vs.

Pinned

●P

osture/Cleanliness

●Literature needed for several genera/species of bees.

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ROOHFWLRQFavorite specim

ens, other unsung heroes, and anomalies

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