THE JEPSON GLOBE A Newsletter from the Friends of The Jepson Herbarium VOLUME 28 NUMBER 1, Spring 2018 Curator’s Column: The changing funding land- Cryptic diversity revisited scape of the Herbaria By Bruce G. Baldwin By Brent D. Mishler In early February, the California The annual budget of the University Native Plant Society hosted its fourth and Jepson Herbaria is comprised of five conservation conference focusing on primary types of funding: (1) support California’s native flora and vegetation. from the UC Berkeley campus (funds Among the timely topics addressed provided by the State of California), (2) at the meeting was cryptic diversity annual distributions from endowment and its implications for conservation funds designated for the Herbaria, (3) management. In particular, the focus grant funding, (4) private giving by in- was on the growing number of previ- dividual donors including the Friends of ously overlooked species that have been Bob and Evelyn Berman, 1985. the Jepson Herbarium, and (5) revenue discovered recently based primarily on In appreciation: from the Jepson Workshops and other molecular (usually DNA) data. These Bob Berman’s generous gift sources. taxa can often be difficult to diagnose This funding structure is signifi- or identify based on morphological to Herbaria Futures cantly different from what it was when characteristics (that is, they are morpho- In February of this year, Bob Ber- I became director in 1993. At that time, logically cryptic). A panel, representing man made a generous donation to the the majority of the funding for the Uni- a diverse set of scientific and manage- endowment fund Herbaria Futures in versity and Jepson Herbaria came from ment perspectives, was convened by memory of his wife, Evelyn. With his the State of California. Special projects Aaron Sims and Nick Jensen to discuss contribution to Herbaria Futures, Bob’s such as The Jepson Manual (1993 UC this topic and included Leigh Johnson gift will support the infrastructure and Press) were supported with endowment (Brigham Young Univ.), Julie Kierstead care of the collections housed in the return and volunteers, along with tar- Nelson (Shasta-Trinity National Forest), University and Jepson Herbaria where geted grant funds and gifts. Teresa Sholars (College of the Red- Bob volunteered for five years after Over the past 25 years, the biggest woods/Mendocino College), and me. he retired from a long career at UC change in the funding structure of the The discussion that ensued dem- Berkeley. Funds from Herbaria Fu- herbaria has been a steep reduction in onstrated much progress in thinking tures are also used to cultivate the next funding provided to our department about taxonomy and conservation over generation of botanists, ecologists, and from the UC Berkeley campus. For the past 20 years and illustrated the conservationists, an important issue to example, the current amount of State thoughtfulness that is being applied Bob and to all of us who want to sup- funding allocated to our department to many new botanical discoveries in port these fields of study and encourage is half of what it was in 2007. This is California. others to join our community. (Continued on page 2) There was recognition that a higher Bob was born in San Diego and at- priority should be placed on character- tended San Diego State College where ALSO IN THIS ISSUE izing and communicating the minor he received a B.A. in Biology. He next morphological differences between attended Claremont Graduate School JEPSON WORKSHOPS taxa rather than emphasizing how where he received a teaching credential. CELEBRATE 25 YEARS! (Continued on page 11) (Continued on page 2) (Funding, continued from page 1) dwindle, we need to find other sources databasing them and filing them in the a massive loss and is indicative of a to support our core activities in collec- collection (more than 10,000 speci- continuing trend that shows no sign of tion management and curation. mens/year), maintaining the library slowing down. There are many reasons In past years, when our department and archives, responding to research for the steady reductions in state fund- has received a budget cut, I have man- queries, overseeing activity on two ing to the University of California, and aged it in a variety of ways, with big large grants (digitizing microfungi and our department is certainly not alone— impacts to our infrastructure coming facilities upgrades in the Silva Center every department on campus has had from often being unable to fill positions for Phycological Documentation), and significant decreases in funding. of staff members who retired. Under managing the volunteer program. These Despite a changing funding land- this solution, our department has been core activities are the infrastructural scape, our widely acclaimed efforts in reduced in size but mid-career employ- foundation of the University and Jepson research, curation, outreach, and formal ees were not affected. Unfortunately, Herbaria, on which we are able to build education have remained successful this fiscal year, facing additional budget our research and outreach programs. and have continued to grow. To a con- cuts, and with nowhere else to reduce Gifts to the Herbaria Futures En- siderable extent, we have been able to costs (due to previous cuts), we sadly dowment Fund are a long-term invest- compensate for the continuing decline lost a key position, that of Assistant ment in the core herbarium activities in state funding by the addition of new Director for Collections. described above. We are grateful to Bob endowment funds, a greatly accelerated The Collections Management staff Berman for his recent gift (see cover pursuit of extramural grant funding, are now running as a skeletal crew. story) and encourage others to join him initiating and developing the Jepson They are still managing ~2,200,000 by contributing to Herbaria Futures Public Programs, and the increasing specimens including a world-class fern with a donation of cash or securities, in- generosity of our individual donors. collection, especially from the New cluding the Herbaria in your estate plan, While these new sources of funding are World tropics, a top-notch marine algae listing the Herbaria as a beneficiary on essential for maintaining and growing collection, and extensive bryophyte, your retirement accounts, or by direct- our public-facing programs, basic infra- lichen, and fungal collections. They ing your mandatory IRA distribution structural needs have remained a con- are responsible for managing our on- to the Herbaria. cern. Such needs are difficult to fund line specimen databases (including the For more information, please con- through grants (which are designed to Consortium of California Herbaria), tact Staci Markos, Assistant Director support new programs), thus we have processing all incoming and outgoing for Development & Outreach, at (510) always reserved our State funds for core loans (approximately 2,000 specimens 643-7008, [email protected] or infrastructure, and now, as those funds per year), mounting new accessions, visit us online; ucjeps.berkeley.edu/ (Berman, continued from page 1) several co-authored papers, he was When Evelyn retired, they moved Bob intended to teach high school biol- feeling the need for a change and this to Pacific Grove. After 18 wonderful ogy but at the time the only openings was the beginning of a new career as years, they decided it was time to be for biology teachers were inland, and, curator of the microbial collections for near family and they returned to the Bay preferring coastal living, Bob chose the Department of Botany. He stayed Area. Evelyn passed away in September a position in Monterey teaching 5th in that position until he retired in late 2017 and, shortly after, Bob moved to grade. Although he got along well with 1984, after a total of 33 years with the Eureka, California, to be near his son, his young students, he decided to look University. Kenneth. The arrangement has worked for a profession where he could more While waiting for his wife Evelyn to well and Bob has been able to keep directly apply his knowledge of biology. retire, he became a volunteer in the Jep- in touch with Bay Area friends. Bob One morning, with his curriculum son Herbarium. Initially, Bob worked enjoys reading The Jepson Globe and vitae in hand, he entered the employ- with Susan D’Alcamo overseeing the hearing about current projects at the ment office at UC Berkeley and, to his Friends of the Jepson Herbarium. Herbaria, old friends, and new faculty surprise and delight, was offered the When the effort began to produce The and students. With a deep appreciation position of Research Associate in a Jepson Manual (published in 1993 by for the time he spent at UC Berkeley lab connected to the School of Public UC Press), Bob became very interested. and for what the Herbaria represent to Health. He enthusiastically accepted As a microbiologist, he lacked some of the scientific community, and to inspire and found himself with an interest- the skills for work with higher plants others to invest in the Herbaria, Bob ing group of people studying various and Jim Hickman, Editor, kindly and provided a generous gift that will add aspects of California Valley Fever patiently came in with the help needed to the foundational support provided by (i.e., coccidioidomycosis). After eight so that Bob could contribute to the the endowment fund Herbaria Futures. years of research with this group, plus revision. 2 Celebrating 25 Years of Jepson Workshops This year the Jepson Herbarium workshop program is celebrating its 25th year! This momentous occasion has been made possible by the Friends of the Jepson Herbarium, our knowledgeable and generous expert instructors, our talented and thoughtful program coordinators, and each and every workshop participant (over 9,000 since 1994!).