This project is aimed at developing an online resource for the dissemination of taxonomic information, images, and diagnostic tools for cultivated plants. As such it affects a broad array of scientists, agriculturists, business, and the public. As a resource for identifying plants, it has an impact on those interested in ornamental plants, food crops, weed control, urban planning, ecology, biodiversity, and forestry. The nursery and seed business, a multibillion dollar industry in the U.S., benefits from the availability of both high quality images and verified taxonomic names for horticulturally important plants.

Development of this project was spurred by the need for a comprehensive resource that can provide basic information and images of all of the commonly cultivated plants in the U.S. This is the legacy of the work of L.H. Bailey and his L.H. Bailey Hortorium.

A comprehensive website has been developed to deliver an ever-increasing array of taxonomically organized, relationally databased images, diagnostic tools, nomenclature, and other facts about both cultivated and non-cultivated plants. The site now includes more than 20,000 images, and is accessed by more than 450 users on an average weekday. Google accounts for more than 70 percent of the hits on the site, with more than 7,000 users accessing the site through google.com in the first six weeks of 2006. This indicates a much broader audience than a merely scientific or academic clientele, and undoubtedly includes amateur gardeners, nursery proprietors, farmers, and others interested in flowering plants. This high hit rate was achieved by careful design of the websites, and cross-referencing with an extensive common-names database developed from our nursery and seed catalogue collection and Hortorium publications such as Hortus Third.

There are no direct economic impacts from this project.

Horticultural Systematics