University and Jepson Herbaria

The University and Jepson Herbaria are two separate herbaria at the University of California, Berkeley. These botanical natural history museums are located on the ground floor of the Valley Life Sciences Building on the main campus of the university in Berkeley, California. There are a number of ancillary collections such as the Fruit & Cone Collection, Horticultural Herbarium and Spirit Collection. Holotypes are maintained separately for both Herbaria. The Charterhouse School Herbarium (Index Herbariorum designation GOD) is housed separately within the University Herbarium. The Herbaria have an open house every year on CalDay with a range of activities for children and adults.

Founded in 1890 with the new Department of Botany, the focus of the University Herbarium is worldwide and includes vascular plants, bryophytes, algae, and fungi. Originally located in South Hall (UC Berkeley) the University herbarium grew rapidly and now contains over 2.2 million specimens. Although not officially named 'Director', William Albert Setchell, whose primary interest was marine algae, officially established the University Herbarium and was chair of the Botany Department. He was succeeded in 1933 by Herbert L. Mason in 1933, Lincoln Constance in 1963 and Robert Ornduff in 1975. 1982 saw Thomas Duncan as Director lead ambitious digitization efforts. These efforts were furthered with the appointment of Brent D. Mishler (a bryologist and Professor in the Department of Integrative Biology) as Director in 1993. Under Mishler's leadership the Consortium of California Herbaria database was established in 2003 to serve as a gateway to information from California vascular plant specimens that are housed in herbaria throughout the state. The Herbaria currently have over 375,000 digitized specimens with a combined total for the consortium of over 1.3 million specimens.

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