Special Collections

Type specimens are the original specimens used to determine the name of a plant.  They act as the reference material for the original name designation and therefore are very important to botanist that study taxonomy and phylogeny of plants. Type specimens are stored separately in the most secure part of the collection. The MU Herbarium Type Collection contains approximately 800 vascular species, 250 bryophyte species, and 350 mycological specimens.  Several hundred were initially acquired when MU purchased the Oberlin Collection (OC) in 1967.  H.A. Miller added several hundred bryophyte types during his research expeditions in the 1960’s.  More information can be found in Vincent, M.A., 1991 Vascular Plant Type Specimens in the Willard Sherman Turrell Herbarium (MU) Miami University, Oxford, Ohio. Rhodora, Vol. 93, No. 874 (April 1991), pp. 148-182. New England Botanical Club, Inc.

Our wood collection was assembled by Charles Heimsch and is linked to his slide collection.  Our wood collection is not yet accessioned into our regular collection though we have plans to begin integrating the sample in the Summer of 2024.

MU has an archive of approximately 19,000 microscope slides of wood, stems, and roots of vascular plants from the research of C. Heimsch and T.K. Wilson.

Our collection of fossil plants is largely collected from western North America, along with coal balls and fossil wood by W.H. Blackwell and others.  These specimens are not currently digitized though MU has plans to image and upload in the summer of 2024.  Then you will be able to search the collection on the Pteridophyte Collection Consortium.

The Turrell Herbarium acquired many volumes of cryptogamic exsiccatae with the acquisition of the Oberlin Herbarium in 1967 (Table 1).  All of the samples contained in these collected works are accessioned into our regular collection and are available on either the Consortium of Bryophyte Herbaria or the Mycology Collections Portal.

Table 1.  Exsiccatae titles in the Turrell Herbarium.

Since the material presented in these collections is very small, the volumes of exsiccatae have been kept intact and specimens have not been integrated into our regular collection.