Abstract | There are approximately 500 biological research and/or field stations worldwide, at least some of which maintain research collections of various types. These institutions typically focus on specific geographic regions, biodiversity hotspots, or ecologically important natural areas and the collections they hold are often similarly restricted in scope. The professionals who curate these collections are often ecologists, systematists, or field researchers and often do not see themselves as primarily collections professionals. Yet, the collections they manage could provide important data to the scientific community if their data and specimens were digitized. This presentation will consider two important biological research stations from Florida, USA, including Tall Timbers Research Station and Archbold Biological Station. The presentation will recount the ongoing digitization efforts being conducted at these stations and the methods utilized for distributing their digitized data to the larger scientific community
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