Digitizing the Collection of the Orma J. Smith Natural History Museum at the College of Idaho

The goals of this project are to improve curation of and provide online accessibility to the natural history collection at the Orma J Smith Museum (OJSM), The College of Idaho, for the purposes of science, education, and conservation. The OJSM collection contains specimens of freshwater fish from Idaho and Montana, aquatic insects of Idaho and Washington, spiders and insects from the intermountain west and Baja California, and fossil plant specimens from the Succor Creek formation of southeastern Oregon. The collection is valuable to society as an indication of regional biodiversity and how it has changed through time, relative especially to climate change and human land use activities. Many specimens were collected more than 150 years ago, and this material can be used to examine populations from an era with much lower human populations and much different land use activities. Comparing material from the present with the past can lead to important insights on how humans influence key species, and can lead to more informed conservation decisions. The collection is also valuable as a resource for K-12 students, by offering opportunity to engage in real-world science, improving science awareness, fostering science identity in under-represented populations, and improving thinking skills. The digitization process will secure digital data about the collection and enhance the visibility and attractiveness of the OJSM to visitors, including teachers, students, and the public. The OJSM collection has over three million specimens collected over the past 150 years, primarily from localities in the U.S. intermountain west and Baja California. Like other arid and semi-arid systems worldwide, these two regions have experienced substantial change in the past century due to climate change, rapid development, mining, logging, grazing, and invasion of non-native species. Documenting the biodiversity of these regions and assessing changes through time are important for research and for conservation planning. The current project will digitize material from six key collections of the OJS Museum: 1) freshwater fish from Idaho and Montana; 2) aquatic macro-invertebrates from Idaho and Washington state; 3) insects and spiders from the U.S. Great Basin; 4) beetles from Baja California; and 6) paleo-botanical specimens from the Succor Creek formation in Oregon. All digital data will maintained in the NSF-supported collection management system Specify 7, and published through on-line resources including iDigBio, SCAN-bugs, NatureServe, and the North American Aquatic Macroinvertebrate Digital Reference Collection. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.