The objective of this Identification Aid package is to provide the Erica enthusiast with a simple aid to help identify Ericas. This based on as few simple characters as possible and all visible with a 10x magnifier.
Hopefully this will reduce the number of Erica species to a manageable number, among which your unknown Erica may readily be found.
The detailed drawings and pictures may then be compared to the sample to enable the user to determine the species. Due to the limited number of characters in this package, use of the Diagnostics & notes may have to be resorted to in order to come to a final decision, but this aspect is far from complete due to the vast number of species that still need to be dealt with.
The electronic key is available from the Bolus Herbarium UCT, and the Kirstenbosch Book Shop.
Contributors/Acknowledgements
Dr EGH ‘Ted’ Oliver was the Erica taxonomist based at the South African National Biodiversity Institute, Kirstenbosch, Cape Town, South Africa. Since retiring in 2003 he has been a research associate at Stellenbosch University. He has worked on the genus since 1959 and with his wife (see below) provided the data and documentation for this Erica Identification Aid.
Inge Oliver (1947–2003) was a research associate at the South African National Biodiversity Institute, Kirstenbosch, Cape Town, South Africa, working with her husband on Erica taxonomy. Her drawings and sketches with notes of all the Ericas have been scanned for the Erica Identification Aid. Many of the sketches were executed as graphic notes for their research and were not meant to be publishable quality, line drawings. Some additional drawings were done by Ted Oliver and several by other artists and extracted from accounts of the species published in scientific books and journals.
Fritz Volk (1930–2009) was an amateur botanist who after retiring to the Cape, developed a keen interest in the fynbos and botany especially in Proteas, later Ericas and then Iridaceae. He conceived the idea of a simple computer package using Microsoft Access to help identify South African Ericas rather than using the highly complex, international software packages like LUCID and DELTA. He did the initial programming of the package (Genus Erica: Interactive Erica Identification Key, Version 1.00) and the encoding of data from the books and photocopies of journals and files provided by the Olivers. He took photographs of herbarium material where these were lacking from existing photographs of live material. Many of these are being replaced in new versions of the package when live plants are photographed.
Nigel Forshaw is an amateur botanist involved with the Protea Atlas Project at the South African National Biodiversity Institute, but has latterly developed an interest in Ericas. He works in the Information Technology (IT) industry and did the programming for the Erica Identification Aid package. He may be contacted at nigel@worldonline.co.za.
AWS ‘Dolf’ Schumann (1918–2001) took many of the photographs initially used in the Erica Identification package. These were copied by Fritz Volk from the book, ‘Ericas of South Africa’, and permission was kindly granted by Dolf just before he died for their use in the original package. These are now being replaced gradually due to the dotted state of the printed versions. The originals, housed in the Compton Herbarium at Kirstenbosch, cannot be accessed from among the many thousands of Dolf’s slides due to labour and time constraints.
David Small (1939–2010) suggested that the European Ericas be included in the Erica Identification Aid and in so doing, provide a more complete coverage of the world’s Ericas. He was President of the British Heather Society at the time.
Dr Charles Nelson provided information on and photographs of European Ericas and useful comments on the whole program. He is Registrar of cultivar names for the Heather Society and with David Small painstakingly built up a valuable database of all known Erica names whether currently in use, or the thousands of old synonyms from the early literature. This includes hybrids and cultivars.
Prof. Tony Rebelo provided many comments, suggestions and encouragement during the development of the Erica Identification Aid package. He headed up the Protea Atlas Project and is now engaged in research in threatened species at the South African National Biodiversity Institute, Kirstenbosch, Cape Town, South Africa, including iSpot and now iNaturalist
SANBI (South African National Biodiversity Institute) Staff of the Research Centre at Kirstenbosch have been very supportive of the project. The IT section assisted Fritz Volk by providing initial computer tools which were later superseded by a more sophisticated runtime tool. The Compton Herbarium, Kirstenbosch, gave permission for photographs to be taken of the Erica specimens by Fritz Volk and kindly backed the original launch of the CD Version 1.
Many additional photographs have been taken by Ted Oliver for Version 3 and 4. We are very appreciative of photographs provided for this Erica Identification Aid by wildflower enthusiasts: John Oakes(†), Ross Turner, Jan Vlok, Mario Martinez-Azorin, Nigel Forshaw, David Osborne(†), Mike Pirie, Berit Gerhke, Adam Harrower, PieterBester, Mervyn Lotter, Wickus Leeuner, Thys de Villiers, Adrian Mohl, Georg Miehe, David Small(†), Charles Nelson, Alan Hall, Benny Bytebier, Janos Podani, Ralph Clark, Corinne Merry, Petra Wester, Jenny Potgieter, Stefaan Dondeyne, Gavin Schafer, Wesley Berrington, Doug Euston-Brown, Ashley Harvey, Ann Symonds and some anonymous persons. Version 1 allowed for only one photograph per species but a great improvement has been made with Version 3 and 4 in allowing us the opportunity to include many photographs per species—habitat, habit and various close-up shots. This will be a long-term, ongoing process with additions, and also replacements with better photographs, being made in each new version of the package. We ask anyone with good Erica photographs to submit them for inclusion in the next versions of the Identification Aid.
Scans of the vouchers for a DNA project of the three species from Réunion were kindly provided by the Réunion Herbarium.
Useful Publications, both popularand technical (1965 to date)
Useful Publications, all technical (pre1965)
Source: Erica electronic key acknowledgements V4 2018
Comentarios
Erica Aid available for download for free
(from https://www.inaturalist.org/posts/54117-erica-aid-available-for-download-for-free)
I have written permission from Nigel and verbal permission from Ted to freely distribute the electronic Key. You can download it here, in the form of an ISO file: https://drive.google.com/file/d/159VbmC8_gReR4x3NIQvJJBp_QjbPk6Vr/view?usp=sharing.
For those unfamiliar with ISO files, it's basically a virtual copy of the original CD. You can run it as if it's a CD, but instead of double-clicking it, you right click and select 'Mount'. It'll then show up as if you'd put a CD in (i.e. in My Computer). You can then run 'start' follow the installation instructions. It needs to install several programs.
(details on original posting)
Unfortunately the GIS software used for viewing distribution data is not compatible with current versions of Java.
Please feel free to let other potentially interested folks know about this. If you have any trouble installing it, send me a message on iNat and I'll try to help :)
All the best,
Posted by sethmusker sethmusker, July 09, 2021 03:16 PM at https://www.inaturalist.org/posts/54117-erica-aid-available-for-download-for-free
Thanks Tony!
You talk about version 4 ("Version 1 allowed for only one photograph per species but a great improvement has been made with Version 3 and 4 in allowing us the opportunity to include many photographs") but this download is labelled as Version 3. Is Version 4 available? I already have version 3 and was hoping for Version 4.
@nigelforshaw ?? versions?
@nigelforshaw ?? versions?
Version 4 is available at https://bit.ly/3nxwypz
This will apparently always deliver the latest version:
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.10407033
New Species Page of the Erica Identification Aid. Showing characters, distribution, subspecies, references and synonyms.
New Google Earth distribution summary (showing all the Erica plukenetii subspecies and details for a selected locality).
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