Florabank1: a grid-based database on vascular plant distribution in the northern part of Belgium (Flanders and the Brussels Capital region)

    Dataset

    Description

    Florabank1 is a database that contains distributional data on the wild flora (indigenous species, archeophytes
    and naturalised aliens) of Flanders and the Brussels Capital Region. It holds about 3 million records
    of vascular plants, dating from 1800 till present. Furthermore, it includes ecological data on vascular plant
    species, redlist category information, Ellenberg values, legal status, global distribution, seed bank etc. The
    database is an initiative of “Flo.Wer” (www.plantenwerkgroep.be), the Research Institute for Nature and
    Forest (INBO: www.inbo.be) and the National Botanic Garden of Belgium (www.br.fgov.be). Florabank
    aims at centralizing botanical distribution data gathered by both professional and amateur botanists and
    to make these data available to the benefit of nature conservation, policy and scientific research.
    The occurrence data contained in Florabank1 are extracted from checklists, literature and herbarium
    specimen information. Of survey lists, the locality name (verbatimLocality), species name, observation
    date and IFBL square code, the grid system used for plant mapping in Belgium (Van Rompaey 1943),
    is recorded. For records dating from the period 1972-2004 all pertinent botanical journals dealing with
    Belgian flora were systematically screened. Analysis of herbarium specimens in the collection of the National
    Botanic Garden of Belgium, the University of Ghent and the University of Liège provided interesting
    distribution knowledge concerning rare species, this information is also included in Florabank1.
    The data recorded before 1972 is available through the Belgian GBIF node (http://data.gbif.org/
    datasets/resource/10969/), not through FLORABANK1, to avoid duplication of information. A
    dedicated portal providing access to all published Belgian IFBL records at this moment is available at:
    http://projects.biodiversity.be/ifbl
    Date made available17-Aug-2011
    PublisherInstituut voor Natuur- en Bosonderzoek

    Thematic List 2020

    • Protected nature
    • Forest
    • Data & infrastructure

    Taxonomic list

    • vascular plants (Tracheophyta)

    Geographic list

    • Brussels-Capital region
    • Flanders

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