4. Inspiring Discovery through Free Access
to Biodiversity Knowledge
Over 10 years of inspiring discovery
15th-21st centuries
through
free & open access
to biodiversity literature & archives
from the
Mission
The Biodiversity Heritage Library improves research
methodology by collaboratively making biodiversity
literature openly available to the world as part of a
global biodiversity community.
7. Natural history literature and archives contain
information that is critical to studying life on Earth.
SPECIES
DESCRIPTIONS
DISTRIBUTION
RECORDS
HISTORY OF
SCIENTIFIC
DISCOVERY
CLIMATE
RECORDS
INFORMATION
ON EXTINCT
SPECIES
SCIENTIFIC
OBSERVATIONS
ECOSYSTEM
PROFILES
SCIENTIFIC
ILLUSTRATIONS
9. “Last year I threw down the gauntlet to [BHL staff] and asked if
there was any possibility of BHL arranging to have made available
the entire run of the UK periodical The Gardeners' Chronicle. I
asked because there is nowhere in my country of residence
(Denmark) that holds it, requiring that I make time consuming and
expensive research trips to London or Cambridge in the UK should I
wish to examine the periodical. I was amazed and delighted that
BHL has achieved what I asked. This contribution to the BHL
catalogue has been a real boon to my research.”
Dr. Toby Musgrave
Horticulturalist & Botanist
Lecturer, Danish Institute for Study Abroad
EXTENSIVE
14. Systema naturae
per regna tria
naturae.
Ed. 10, 1758.
Carl von Linné.
biodiversitylibrary.org/bibliography/542
___________________
Considered the starting
point of zoological
nomenclature.
Listed about 10,000
species of organisms, of
which about 6,000 are
plants and 4,236 are
animals.
The earliest work in BHL is
Theophrasti De Historia plantarum liber primus
(1483)
biodiversitylibrary.org/page/40913187
15. Not just “heritage”
collections
> 23% of BHL's collection of
188,970 items is post-1922
> 72.3% of BHL’s collection is
free of copyright restriction in
the United States
As of August 2016
16. Logbook of the
yacht "France"
Whitney South Sea
Expedition of the American
Museum of Natural History
Volume: v.2 (1926-1928)
biodiversitylibrary.org/page/44821245
__________________
BHL includes over 100,000
pages of Field Notes and
related archival material.
Ongoing transcription projects
will make these fully
searchable.
17. Bonn Zoological
Bulletin 61 (1): 135-
39 (July 2012)
biodiversitylibrary.org/page/4482124
___________________
With the assistance of
BioStor, BHL now indexes
over 202,000 articles,
chapters or other “segments”
of BHL content.
These are all searchable
through the bibliographic
interface to BHL.
Scotopteryx kuznetzovi
(Wardikian, 1957)
(Lepidoptera, Geometridae,
Larentiinae),
a new species for the fauna of
Iran and Turkey
Hossein Rajaei Sh.* & Dieter
Stuning
18. Charles Darwin’s Library
biodiversitylibrary.org/browse/collection/darwi
nlibrary
___________________
A digital edition and virtual
reconstruction of the surviving
books owned by Charles Darwin.
It also provides full transcriptions of
his annotations and marks. These
works provide important insight into
the development of Darwin’s ideas
on evolution and natural selection.
"If this were true, adios theory"
Charles Darwin wrote these words
in response to reading Principles of
Geology, v. 2 (1837) by Charles
Lyell, who was arguing that changes
in species have limitations. Darwin,
on the other hand, argued that
changes in species are infinite and
continuous, an integral concept
crucial to his theory of evolution.
19. “[BHL] is a fantastic resource, making research possible
that would never have been considered in the past. I use it
to find information on particular species and also to find
source documents for further analysis. The ability to
search by taxon name is invaluable.”
Dr. Quentin Groom
Research Assistant and Biogeographer
Botanic Garden Meise, Belgium
OPEN
20. A Commitment to Open Access…
BHL is a charter signatory of the Bouchout Declaration
for Open Biodiversity Knowledge Management.
Fundamental principles of the Declaration:
Free & Open Use
Policies to Foster Free &
Open Access
Persistent Identifiers
Tracking Identifiers to
Ensure Attribution
Infrastructure, Standards &
Protocols to Improve Access
Linked Data
Sustainable Knowledge Management
Registers for Content &
Services
23. Agatea violaris
Type specimen from the
U.S. National Herbarium
(Smithsonian Institution)
collected by the United
States Exploring
Expedition, 1838-1842
24. Agatea violaris
Type specimen from the
U.S. National Herbarium
(Smithsonian Institution)
collected by the United
States Exploring
Expedition, 1838-1842
Illustration from the USExEx
28. “Congratulations on a superior on-line library service that is of
great help to anybody that has no direct access to old literature
(like many scientists in developing countries). I used to be
located in the Natural History Museum in Leiden, Netherlands
with an excellent library, but after my retirement I moved to
Brazil and lost direct contact with the Leiden library. In many
cases BHL now provides what I am looking for.”
Dr. Marinus Hoogmoed
Curator of Reptiles and Amphibians, 1963-2003
Naturalis Biodiversity Center
GLOBAL
29. BHL is a Global Consortium
18MEMBERS
AS OF MARCH 2017
15AFFILIATES
60+ WORLDWIDE PARTNERS
30. 1. London
2. New York
3. Mexico City
4. Paris
5. Sydney
6. Berlin
7. Washington
8. Melbourne
9. New Delhi
10. Sao Paulo
Top 10 Cities by Sessions, CY 2016
31. 1. Bangkok
2. Quezon City
3. Singapore
4. Jakarta
5. Hanoi
6. Makati
7. Kuala Lumpur
8. Cebu City
9. Ho Chi Minh City
10. Surabaya
Top 10 ASEAN Cities by Sessions, CY 2016
32. 5.9+MILLION
TOTAL USERS TO DATE
AVERAGE MONTHLY
USERS (CY16)109,000+
11+ MILLION
TOTAL WEBSITE VISITS TO DATE
AVERAGE MONTHLY
VISITS (CY16)176,000+
VISITS FROM
243COUNTRIES &
TERRITORIES
*Stats as of February 2017
34. 8.51% sessions
Mobile Sessions CY 2015
10.45% sessions
Mobile Sessions CY 2016
Mobile sessions increase by 34.43% over the past year
35. “BHL is radically changing the status quo and
democratizing access to knowledge about
biodiversity. Now anyone in the world has
instant access to the original species
description in a couple of clicks.”
Dr. John Sullivan
Evolutionary Biologist
Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia
Cornell University
GLOBAL &
COLLABORATIVE
37. BHL collaborates with and contributes
content to a variety of partners…
Two more recent collaboration opportunities
38. Engagement
BHL is used in exhibitions in our
partner institutions, such as “Once
There Were Billions” at the National
Museum of Natural History.
39. “BHL provides an excellent service for studies
of marine and other biodiversity. I’ve said it
before, you folks do a great job. Keep up the
good work; you’ve got lots of admirers out
there.”
Dr. Thomas Carefoot
Marine Biologist
University of British Columbia, Canada
Expanding Directions
40. 107,000+
IMAGES IN FLICKR
TOTAL IMAGES
TAGGED29,900+
202+MILLION
TOTAL VIEWS ON IMAGES
OF TOTAL FLICKR
COLLECTION TAGGED
TAGGED IMAGES IN
EOL
27% 18,000+
BHL FLICKR NAMED 1 OF WIRED’S
27 MUST-FOLLOW FEEDS IN
THE WORLD OF SCIENCE
*Stats as of November 2016
WWW.FLICKR.COM/BIODIVLIBRARY
42. Support BHL Financial Sustainability
CafePress: http://www.cafepress.com/biodiversityheritagelibrary
43. 64,500+
TOTAL FOLLOWERS ON
SOCIAL MEDIA
TOTAL FOLLOWERS
11,800+
TOTAL FOLLOWERS
11,400+
TOTAL FOLLOWERS
32,300+
TOTAL FOLLOWERS
5,000+
AVERAGE MONTHLY
READERS (CY16)
2,300+
FOLLOW @BIODIVLIBRARY
*Stats as of February 2017
TOTAL FOLLOWERS
4,000+
44. AWARDS
• Digital Library Federation (DLF) 2016
Community/Capacity Award (joint recipient with
Archive of American Broadcasting).
2016
• Internet Archive Hero Award. Global Leaders
in Sharing Knowledge.
2015
• Laureate. IDG’s Computerworld Honors
Program.
• Charles Robert Long Award of Extraordinary
Merit. Council on Botanical and Horticultural
Libraries.
2013
• Victorian Government Arts Leadership
Recognition Award (BHL Australia).
2012
• John Thackray Medal. The Society for the
History of Natural History.
2011
• Outstanding Collaboration Award. Association
for Library Collections & Technical Services
(ALCTS).
2010
45. “Joining BHL represents a greater opportunity for CONABIO
to provide broader access to Mexico’s biodiversity knowledge
contained within published literature. We believe that only
with a well-informed society it is possible to develop and
strengthen a culture of appreciation and valuation of
Mexico’s natural capital.”
Dr. José Sarukhán
CONABIO National Coordinator
Mexico City, Mexico
In Closing …
47. A Larger Context …
Convention on Biodiversity (CBD Article 17, 1992)
“It shall also, where feasible, include repatriation of
information.”
48. A Larger Context …
Darwin Declaration (1998)
“The essential requirements for accessing and utilising this
global information are: that existing information held in literature
and by current experts is made available electronically”
49. A Larger Context …
The Biodiversity Commons
BHL strives to be part of that larger Biodiversity Commons and
provide a space for the literature of biodiversity to be widely
available
50. The Commons succeeds when,
among other elements, there is
"the presence of a community;
small and stable populations
with a thick social network and
social norms".
Elinor Ostrom, "Sustainable development and the
tragedy of commons" (2009)
51. BHL has created that community
among our natural history and
botanical libraries
52. By engaging with the larger biodiversity
community, by being a cornerstone of
the “biodiversity conmons,” and major
stakeholder institutions, BHL is creating
a sustainable biodiversity commons for
the literature of taxonomy.
59. THE STORY OF ENGAGEMENT
USING OUTREACH TO
SHARE THE BHL STORY
Grace Costantino
Share your thoughts on social media using #BHLib
BHL Outreach and Communication Manager
60. OUTREACH STRATEGY
USING OUR BLOG AND SOCIAL MEDIA TO ENGAGE
WITH AUDIENCES AND SHARE OUR STORIES
blog.biodiversitylibrary.org
@BioDivLibrary on:
www.flickr.com/biodivlibrary
61. SUPPORTING ACCESS,
RESEARCH & IMPACT
Dr. Nura Abdul Karim
“SBG Library believes that BHL, with its
rich digital repository of biological
information, will continue to play an
important role in botanical research and
has indirectly also become a platform for
long-term preservation of historical and
legacy biodiversity literatures.”
DEPUTY DIRECTOR | Library, Training & External Relations.
Singapore Botanic Gardens
62. SUPPORTING…
Access
Dr. Nura Abdul Karim
“In Southeast Asia, many of the researchers in
botanical institutions with very limited resources
are hard-pressed to access important literature
that may only be available in a few select
libraries in the developed world. Information
inequality between developing and developed
world researchers can be narrowed with the
availability of open access digital repositories.”
Plants, seeds and orchids outward
register, 26 July 1957-27 October 1959.
Digitized by Singapore Botanic Gardens.
www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/206359.
63. SUPPORTING…
Research
Dr. Nura Abdul Karim
“Taxonomy, systematic biology and
conservation are more dependent on historic
literature than many other fields of science.
Access to a wider array of literature through
BHL can have a profound and positive impact
on biodiversity in the region as research can
be more wide ranging, accurate and speedy
and the data vital in many fields of science
and conservation can be published in a much
shorter timeframe.”
Plants and seeds inward register,
16 January 1920-28 August 1926.
Digitized by Singapore Botanic Gardens.
www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/206637.
64. SUPPORTING…
Library Impact
Dr. Nura Abdul Karim
“Over time, the SBG Library has amassed a
good collection of rare and scholarly printed
literature, housed in a climate-controlled archive
room, which are accessible to, and utilised by,
only a handful of privileged in-house researchers.
Recently, SBG Library has embarked on a
programme of restoring and digitising the
collections. Access via BHL will allow far greater
access to academics, researchers and students,
and possibly even to the global public, than was
ever possible before.”List of Books in Library. 1903-1909.
Digitized by Singapore Botanic Gardens.
www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/206736.
65. SUPPORTING SCIENCE
Dr. Varad B. Giri
“BHL is doing a wonderful service for
researchers like me, who work with limited
resources in developing countries like India.
For our recent paper dealing with a 180 year
old taxonomic mystery, we needed to refer to
many historical articles. Without the help of
BHL, this would have taken more time or
been very difficult.”
POST DOCTORAL FELLOW |
National Centre for Biological Sciences (Bangalore, India)
66. SUPPORTING…
Science
Hardwicke's bloodsucker. Previously classified as
Brachysaura minor. By researching the taxonomic history
of this species using BHL, in combination with molecular
and morphological data, Dr. Giri and his coauthors
provided a new name (Calotes minor) and placement for
this species in a 2015 Vertebrate Zoology paper.
Published Online at: www.senckenberg.de /vertebrate-zoology
Calotes minor. Photo credit: Varad Giri
67. SUPPORTING…
Science
“For a taxonomist like me, BHL is an
amazing resource. BHL has had a big,
positive impact on my research by
putting all of the historical literature
online where one can access it with
ease. I strongly feel that if BHL would
not have been available, I would not
have performed good taxonomic work
with such ease due to a lack of
historical literature.”The original description of Calotes minor.
Dr. Giri downloaded this paper using BHL!
The Zoological Journal. v. 3 (1827-1828).
www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/27485744.
Digitized by Smithsonian Libraries.
Dr. Varad B. Giri
68. SUPPORTING HISTORY OF
SCIENCE RESEARCH
Dr. Paul D. Brinkman
“BHL is a wonderful resource. I use a lot of
old and obscure resources in my line of work,
and BHL makes getting access to these
sources a lot easier.”
HEAD OF THE HISTORY OF SCIENCE RESEARCH LAB |
North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences
69. SUPPORTING…
History of Science
The Question: When did Charles Darwin
become a "convinced transmutationist”?
During, or after, the Beagle voyage?
Forming an hypothesis requires access to
Darwin’s publications and the books in his
library. BHL provided these.
In a 2010 paper published in Journal of the History of
Biology, Dr. Brinkman argues that Darwin’s own Beagle
journals support the early conversion hypothesis. For
example, Darwin discusses similarities between some of
the fossils he was collecting and extant species - notably
Glyptodontinae fossils and living armadillos.
Glyptodontinae are an extinct subfamily of large, heavily
armored armadillos.
Description d'un nouveau genre d'édenté fossile
renfermant plusieurs espèces voisines du glyptodon.
Digitized by Harvard University, Museum of Comparative
Zoology, Ernst Mayr Library.
www.biodiversitylibrary.org/item/181758.
70. SUPPORTING…
History of Science
"I probably use old museum annual
reports more than any other single
resource on BHL. A lot of these old
reports have been relegated to offsite
storage at many university libraries,
which can sometimes mean long delays.
BHL, however, provides them at the click
of a button!"
Dr. Paul D. Brinkman
Darwin's rhea (Rhea pennata).
The existence of two distinct rhea species,
coexisting in the same habitat, impacted Darwin’s
ideas on the mutability of species.
The zoology of the voyage of H.M.S. Beagle.
Pt. 3 (Birds) (1841). Digitized by MBLWHOI Library.
www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/14062633
71. SUPPORTING EDUCATION
Dr. Tracey Hunter-Doniger
“Before photography, scientists used
drawings to record what they saw.
Scientists also had to be artists. These
lesson plans are an opportunity for
students to see how art and science are
connected.”
ASSISTANT PROFESSOR | College of Charleston
72. Link to Catesby volumes in BHL and
the Catesby lesson plans available to
teachers through PBS Learning Media!
SUPPORTING…
Education
Example of the 3rd and 5th
grade Catesby lesson,
whereby students "zoom" in
on details in the specimen
being observed. Example
by Dr. Tracey Hunter-
Doniger.
The Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the
Bahama Islands.1st ed. 1729-1747.
Digitized by Smithsonian Libraries.
www.biodiversitylibrary.org/bibliography/62015
73. SUPPORTING…
Education
“Having access to this literature through
BHL is a treasure. Being able to show
the students the prints of the original
artworks and use them to explain that
these represent what Catesby saw and
what he wanted to convey speaks
volumes to the students.”
The Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the
Bahama Islands.1st ed. 1729-1747.
Digitized by Smithsonian Libraries.
www.biodiversitylibrary.org/bibliography/62015
Dr. Tracey Hunter-Doniger
74. SUPPORTING ART
Emily Williams
“The Biodiversity Heritage Library is an
amazing resource for visual artists! Any artist
interested in learning about natural history
and science would consider these rare
resources invaluable.”
GLASS ARTIST & ADJUNCT ART PROFESSOR | Troy University
75. SUPPORTING…
Art “This book features some very detailed illustrations on Crinoids.
The ability to visually understand how a Crinoid is structured
becomes part of my unique creative process. Discovering an
exciting branching pattern or joint segmentation may inspire an
entire sculpture.”
Emily Williams
Manuel D’actinologie ou de
Zoophytologie. 1850.
Harvard University, Museum of Comparative
Zoology, Ernst Mayr Library.
www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/9321291.
Glass Seaweed sculpture
by Emily Williams, 2014.
Created using borosilicate glass
and a glass hand-torch.
76. SUPPORTING…
Art
“Finding detailed illustrations of certain
ocean life forms can be very difficult and
time-consuming. Through the BHL website
I can input various search terms to access
an abundance of research materials. I am
most drawn to the digitized books from the
19th century containing beautiful, detailed
illustrations. Being a visual artist I find the
high-resolution images invaluable. This
allows me to enlarge and examine
intricate illustrations as if using a
microscope!”
Emily WilliamsEmily Williams creating Glass Seaweed
sculpture in her Columbus, Georgia studio.
77. SUPPORTING TAXONOMY
Dr. Barna Páll-Gergely
“Simply speaking we need three main
things for a taxonomy: (1) type
specimens of known species deposited
in museums, (2) previously not
examined material, and (3) literature.
BHL provided nearly all the literature we
needed.”
BIOLOGIST | Department of Biology, Shinshu University (Japan)
78. SUPPORTING TAXONOMY
Vargapupa biheli
“We may think it is natural to have old literature
online, but if we didn't, we would have serious
trouble finding the relevant publications. Therefore
I thought BHL definitely deserves a new species
named after it for the help it provided.”
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.3937.1.1
Dr. Barna Páll-Gergely
79. VIEW MORE BHL USER
STORIES ON OUR BLOG
http://bit.do/BHLUserPosts
80. Thank You!
Questions?
Martin R. Kalfatovic (KalfatovicM@si.edu)
Grace Costantino (CostantinoG@si.edu)
Stay Connected with BHL!
Follow @BioDivLibrary on social media
Join our Mailing List: library.si.edu/bhl-newsletter-signup