Compton Herbarium (NBG)

The herbarium at the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden has had a chequered history over the last 80 years. The first building was erected in 1924 and housed the University of Cape Town’s Bolus Herbarium for some 14 years before it was relocated to the University. The then director of the garden, Prof. Robert Harold Compton, had started a separate collection in his own office and appointed Miss Buddy Barker to curate and expand it in 1935. This collection housed in 18 cabinets was moved to the vacant herbarium building in 1940. Then began a vigorous expansion of the collections, which amounted to 57,000 sheets in 119 cabinets when Compton retired in 1953. (He then moved to Swaziland where he began building another herbarium collection!) In 1956, the trustees of the South African Museum transferred their herbarium (SAM) of 118 cabinets, as well as the botanist Dr Joyce Lewis and another staff member, to Kirstenbosch. With the amalgamation of the Botanical Research Institute (BRI) and National Botanical Gardens (NBG), the Compton Herbarium became part of the National Botanical Institute (NBI, now SANBI). In 1996, the Stellenbosch Herbarium (STE) was integrated with the Compton Herbarium in the newly erected research complex at Kirstenbosch. The Compton Herbarium is now the second largest herbarium in southern Africa.

History
The South African Museum Herbarium (SAM), the oldest in Africa and one of the oldest in the southern hemisphere, originated when the visiting German collector, C.F. Ecklon, deposited 325 of his specimens in the museum in 1825. Dr. Ludwig Pappe took charge of the herbarium when the museum was reorganised in 1855, and he is considered its founder. He was appointed as the first Colonial Botanist in 1858. On his death in 1863, his private collection, which included Carl Zeyher’s main herbarium, was bought for the Cape Government Herbarium. This was housed in the same room in the Museum as the Museum Herbarium. Under Prof. Peter MacOwan, Colonial Botanist, the two collections gradually merged and increased considerably. In 1910, the Cape Government ceded the so-called “Cape Government Herbarium” to the Museum. It has been housed in the Compton Herbarium at Kirstenbosch since 1956 and was finally donated to the NBI by the Trustees of the South African Museum in 1988.

Dr Vera Duthie founded the Stellenbosch Herbarium (STE) on her appointment to the Victoria College (now the University of Stellenbosch) in 1902. Owing to lack of funds, the University Council handed the general herbarium over to the State and in 1960, it became known as the Government Herbarium/Staatsherbarium, Stellenbosch. The University (STEU) retained the District Herbarium covering the Stellenbosch area. With the rationalisation of the state botanical interests in 1989, it became part of the new National Botanical Institute, but was only combined with the NBG herbarium in 1996.

Collections
The collections are housed in the modern research complex built in 1996 in the Kirstenbosch National Botanical Garden in Cape Town. The building is situated on the eastern slopes of Table Mountain just below some patches of fine afromontane forest.

The modern metal cupboards have magnetically sealing doors. Ventilation is of the filtered, forced-air variety—full air-conditioning being too expensive. The specimens are arranged following the system employed in the List of Southern African Plants based on PRECIS.

The approximately 500,000 specimens mainly cover the winter-rainfall region of southern Africa and contribute towards the understanding of the biodiversity of the unique Cape Floral Kingdom. There are many valuable old specimens from around the world in SAM. The collections consist only of pteridophytes, gymnosperms, and angiosperms. The marine algal collections were recently donated to the University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg (NU), the fungi to the National Mycological Herbarium in Pretoria (PREM), and the lichens and bryophytes to our sister herbarium, the National Herbarium in Pretoria (PRE). For historical reasons, the SAM collections—oldest in the country—are kept separate from the general herbarium and are sent out on loan under the SAM label.

For the last two years, the herbarium has had assistance from the SABONET programme with the databasing of these collections. To date 28,000 specimens have been encoded, covering the grasses and the first of the important families in our area: Amaryllidaceae and Iridaceae. These will be followed by the Restionaceae, Ericaceae, and Proteaceae. At the current rate, it will take some 15 years to encode all the herbarium collections. Problems have arisen with deciphering the old handwriting—especially German Gothic script and Latin.

Information service
The herbarium provides a wide-ranging information service to the public, environmental planners, conservation bodies, and other researchers. On average, the staff identify about 3,000 specimens a year.

Research
The research undertaken by the staff mainly covers plants from the winter-rainfall region—Proteaceae, Ericaceae, Stilbaceae, Amaryllidaceae, Iridaceae, Mesembryanthemaceae, Thymelaeaceae, Campanulaceae, and Orchidaceae. The herbarium fortunately received a grant from Mr Leslie Hill, a 90-year-old Cape Town businessman, recently. This will be used to set up a laboratory for molecular studies, which will greatly assist staff in their work on the phylogenetics and evolution of Cape taxa. A recently published joint project was ‘Cape Plants: a Conspectus of the Cape Flora of South Africa’ covering the 9,000 species in our area.

Staff and research interests

Dr John Rourke—Curator
Proteaceae
Stilbaceae