The newest tool in the arsenal of the botanist is the Internet. Just as you have prepared web pages for posting to the Internet, so have other researchers posted their own work to the Internet. The goal of this laboratory is to expose you to the botanical information resources that are available on the Internet and how to find botanical information efficiently.
There are only a few basic places to start when looking for information.
If you know the Latin binomial for a plant and are trying to obtain more information on that particular plant, go to Inference Find http://www.infind.com Enter the binomial and click on search. Work your way through the search results looking for the information you seek. If the Infind engine is "down" (non-operational), use http://www.hotbot.com Even if you know only the genus, a search engine can still prove useful. In some instances just knowing the phylum will provide useful results. Bryophyte and Cyanobacteria information can be located by searching at the phylum level.
"Drill-down" interfaces start at the phylum level and by choosing the next level down, let one move down through a branching tree to the desired plant. Using a drill down interface requires that one know something about the taxonomy of the plant.
The University of Hawaii has a tropically oriented drill down index that begins at: http://www.botany.hawaii.edu/faculty/carr/pfamilies.htm
The University of Wisconsin has a "drill-down" interface to the plant image collection that lets one move down from phylum to division to order. This drill-down index starts at: http://www.wisc.edu/botit/Systematics/Phyla/Phylum_directory.html
If you think you know the family that the plant belongs to, then you can turn to a number of different sources. This method of finding information is similar to the drill down interfaces covered above.
The University of Wisconsin at Madison Plant Systematics Collection has a Family index at http://www.wisc.edu/botit/Systematics/family_index/family_directory.html and uses an alphabetic guide to obtain more information about the family.
Texas A&M University has a family guide at http://www.csdl.tamu.edu/FLORA/gallery.htm
The site http://www.webring.org/#ringworld is an entry portal to world of web rings. Web rings can be another way to get at useful information in a particular topic.
The WWW Virtual Library is located at http://vlib.org/Overview.html and provides a drill down interface to many topics. The Botany library index is at: http://www.ou.edu/cas/botany-micro/www-vl/ The botany "library" is a page with hundreds of links to botany sites around the world. Sites like http://www.floridaplants.com/ are listed. This site is useful as Florida has tropical plants, some of which are also found here.
A similar service is provided by the award winning CSU Bioweb at: http://arnica.csustan.edu/
College of Micronesia-FSM's Botany 250 also has a web site with some information on our local plants: http://www.geocities.com/TheTropics/Cabana/4705/Botany.html
If http://www.infind.com is not responding, use http://www.hotbot.com instead.
1. Use http://www.infind.com or http://www.hotbot.com to search for and determine the color of the fruit of Artocarpus altilis.
2a. Using http://www.infind.com and the search word
mushrooms, write down the first ten titles shown.
2b. Using http://www.infind.com and the search word
basidiomycetes, write down the first ten titles shown.
2c. Which search produced more botanically useful results?
3a. Use http://www.infind.com to search for
Cordyline fruticosa.
3b. What is the common English name for Cordyline fruticosa?
3c. Does Cordyline fruticosa grow on your home island?
3d. What is the local name, if any, for Cordyline fruticosa, in your own language?
4a. Use the University of Hawaii drill down index http://www.botany.hawaii.edu/faculty/carr/pfamilies.htm to find the color of the flower of Delonix regia.
4b. What plant is listed directly below Delonix regia on the Caesalpiniacieae page?
4c. Where is the plant listed directly below Delonix regia on the Caesalpiniacieae page
found on Pohnpei?
The plant listed above Delonix regia is Senna surattensis. If anyone has seen Senna surattensis on Pohnpei, please let Lee Ling know.
5. Use http://www.wisc.edu/botit/Systematics/Phyla/Phylum_directory.html to drill down to and through the following taxonomic levels to determine the color of the corolla and the number of petals in the shown Cassia species:
The blossom imaged has an unusual number of petals. Looking closely at the picture, what might explain the unusual number of petals?
6. Use the Texas A&M guide http://www.csdl.tamu.edu/FLORA/gallery.htm to drill down and determine the color of the fruit of Podocarpus macrophyllus.
7a. Using the search engine of your choice, what are the medical uses of the noni
fruit?
7b. Is noni found on Pohnpei?
7c. What is the name of the noni fruit, if any, in your local language?
8a. At the site http://www.webring.org/#ringworld
do a search for botany. List the names of the eight rings found there that relate to
botany.
8b. Click on Random to go to a random site in The Palms Ring. Write down the name of the
site or the title of the site to which you were taken.
9. Use the webring list at http://www.webring.org/cgi-bin/webring?ring=herbring&list to find a TROPICAL plant herbal remedy for the flu. In your answer identify both the plant and the site address (URL).
10. Use The WWW Virtual Library at http://vlib.org/Overview.html to find the URLs of the following:
11. What is the CyanoBase site about?
12. Use CSU bioweb to perform a search on the topic area Botany. List the names of the LAST five sites the list provides.
13. What is the Wollemi Pine and why is it so significant?
14. Use the Botany 250 web site to determine the Yapese name for Pandanus
