Resources for BSBI members

Posts on this News & Views blog are usually aimed at all botanists, whether or not they are BSBI members, but this post is actually aimed just at BSBI members. 

If you haven't joined the society yet then sorry about excluding you today but please check back tomorrow, when there will be a review of a training course aimed at beginner botanists. Or head over here and join BSBI!

Now, members: this post is to alert you to some of the latest resources available on the password-protected members' only area of the BSBI website. Firstly, there is a pdf of the most recent issue of BSBI News. Some of us like to have a paper copy of the BSBI's newsletter and some of us prefer to read it on-line. Members can choose either or both, as they please.

Blinks Montia fontana
Image courtesy of John Crellin/Floral Images
http://www.floralimages.co.uk/page.php?
taxon=montia_fontana,1

Secondly, there is an Index, lovingly compiled by Gwynn Ellis, to back issues of BSBI News nos. 111-120. You can find the issues themselves in the BSBI Publications Archive but if you want to find a particular article, using the Index is an easy way to search by keyword for what you want.

Thirdly, there is a new Membership List, updated on 1st May, so you can check contact details of any fellow members (as long as they have agreed to share those details).

There are also a few changes to contact details for our expert plant referees, with a new referee for subspecies of Montia fontana and a change of referee for Populus nigra subspecies betulifolia. 

Catkins of Populus nigra subsp. betulifolia
Courtesy of John Crellin/Floral Images
http://www.floralimages.co.uk/page.php?
taxon=populus_nigra_subsp_betulifolia,1

Access to our 113 expert referees, who between them cover more than 150 difficult plant groups, is one of the main perks of BSBI membership. The names and full contact details of all our referees are in the BSBI Yearbook, sent to members and available in the members' only area, along with details of what sort of material to send them if you need help with a particular identification. Some can accept photographs, some need fresh rather than pressed material, some recommend that you phone them first to check that they are not away on fieldwork... all incredibly useful stuff to know!

If you are a BSBI member and haven't yet used the members' only area, you'll need a password - email me if you've forgotten yours. Don't forget that I'll need either your membership number, or the email address you used when joining, before I can give you a password. Then you'll be able to access six year's worth of New Journal of Botany, read the results of the recent BSBI Review Group, find out about special offers for members... and a lot more!