Biodiversity Heritage Library - Program news and collection highlights from BHL
  • Home
  • News
  • Featured Books
    • All Featured Books
    • Book of the Month Series
  • User Stories
  • Campaigns
    • Fossil Stories
    • Garden Stories
    • Monsters Are Real
    • Page Frights
    • Her Natural History
    • Earth Optimism 2020
  • Tech Blog
  • Visit BHL
Home
News
Featured Books
    All Featured Books
    Book of the Month Series
User Stories
Campaigns
    Fossil Stories
    Garden Stories
    Monsters Are Real
    Page Frights
    Her Natural History
    Earth Optimism 2020
Tech Blog
Visit BHL
  • Home
  • News
  • Featured Books
    • All Featured Books
    • Book of the Month Series
  • User Stories
  • Campaigns
    • Fossil Stories
    • Garden Stories
    • Monsters Are Real
    • Page Frights
    • Her Natural History
    • Earth Optimism 2020
  • Tech Blog
  • Visit BHL
Biodiversity Heritage Library - Program news and collection highlights from BHL

All posts tagged with africa

Blog Reel, User Stories

Chronicling the History of the Former Squires of Coulsdon: Rare Book Digitization Informs Research on the Byron Family

Read the full blog post

The Joseph F. Cullman 3rd Library of Natural History at the Smithsonian Libraries and Archives in Washington, D.C. is home to many rare and special books. Amongst the approximately 20,000 volumes in the library’s collection is a particularly rare item—one of only six known copies in public and institutional libraries worldwide.

The book is a privately printed journal by Edmund Byron entitled What we did in South Africa in 1873, which details Byron and his wife Charlotte’s 1873 exploratory and hunting expedition to South Africa. In 2015, at the request of a researcher, the Smithsonian digitized its copy of the journal and made it freely available online in the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL), where it was discovered by Dr. Nigel Elliott, who was conducting research on the Byron family.

Continue reading
June 10, 2021byGrace Costantino
BHL News, Blog Reel

Promoting the Biodiversity Heritage Library and Scholarly Communications at the Mpala Research Centre in Kenya

Read the full blog post

Under the auspices of Scott Miller, Deputy Under Secretary for Collections and Interdisciplinary Support (DUSCIS) at the Smithsonian Institution and Vice-Chair of the Mpala Research Centre, I spent three days at the Mpala Research Centre in Laikipia County, Kenya with Carolyn A. Sheffield (BHL Program Manager) to learn more about the activities and research at Mpala and to explore partnerships around the Biodiversity Heritage Library and scholarly communications.

Continue reading
June 7, 2017byMartin R. Kalfatovic
BHL News, Blog Reel

Promoting Scholarly Publication Data and the Biodiversity Heritage Library in Kenya with a Special Presentation at the U.S. Embassy, Nairobi

Read the full blog post
In May 2017, while attending the XXI Congress of the Association for the Taxonomic Study of the Flora of Tropical Africa (AETFAT), Smithsonian Libraries’ (SIL) staff Martin R. Kalfatovic and Carolyn A. Sheffield received a speaking invitation for the Embassy of the United States of America, Nairobi, Kenya from Tatum Albertine (Environment, Science, Technology & Health Officer).
Continue reading
June 6, 2017byMartin R. Kalfatovic
Blog Reel, Featured Books

Travels in Southern Africa: William John Burchell

Read the full blog post
William John Burchell is credited “with having been the most prolific collector of botanical and zoological specimens.” [1] During a four-year scientific exploration of South Africa, he amassed a collection of over 63,000 specimens. And yet, Burchell’s contributions to science have been largely overlooked. As William Swainson bemoaned, “science must ever regret that one whose powers of mind were so varied…was so signally neglected in his own country.” [2] 2015 marks the 200th anniversary of Burchell’s return to Cape Town following his four-year expedition in South Africa.
Continue reading
November 19, 2015byGrace Costantino
BHL News, Blog Reel

BHL in Africa! Workshop & TDWG

Read the full blog post
An international ensemble of biodiversity-minded professionals recently gathered in Nairobi, Kenya for two weeks of trainings and conferences. From 24-26 September, 2015, fifteen representatives from eleven institutions throughout South Africa, Kenya, and Uganda attended a BHL Africa training workshop at the National Museums of Kenya. Following the workshop, 28 September – 1 October, 2015, the TDWG Annual Conference was held at the Windsor Golf Hotel and Country Club in Nairobi. The BHL Africa Workshop was an opportunity to provide training and help build capacity amongst the current signatories of the BHL Africa MOU.
Continue reading
October 7, 2015byGrace Costantino
BHL News, Blog Reel

Empowering Access to Biodiversity Information in Africa

Read the full blog post

Almost two years ago, BHL Africa officially launched during a three-day workshop hosted by the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI) at the Pretoria National Botanical Garden in Pretoria, South Africa. In the subsequent two years, BHLA has begun digitization at some participating institutions and has drafted a governance framework for the node.

Continue reading
February 11, 2015byGrace Costantino
BHL News, Blog Reel

BHL’s Latest News!

Read the full blog post

Wondering what BHL has been working on lately? Check out our latest quarterly report which details our production statistics and showcases some of our most recent exciting project accomplishments!

Continue reading
August 27, 2013byCarolyn Sheffield
Page 1 of 3123»

Help Support BHL

BHL’s existence depends on the financial support of its patrons. Help us keep this free resource alive!

Donate Now

search

About BHL

The Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) is the world’s largest open access digital library for biodiversity literature and archives. Headquartered at the Smithsonian Libraries and Archives in Washington, D.C., BHL operates as a worldwide consortium of natural history, botanical, research, and national libraries working together to digitize the natural history literature held in their collections and make it freely available for open access as part of a global “biodiversity community.”

Follow BHL

Join Our Mailing List

Sign up to receive the latest news, content highlights, and promotions.

Subscribe Now

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Subscribe to Blog Via RSS

Subscribe to the blog RSS feed to stay up-to-date on all the latest BHL posts.

Access RSS Feed

BHL on Twitter

Tweets by @BioDivLibrary

Inspiring Discovery through Free Access to Biodiversity Knowledge.

The Biodiversity Heritage Library makes it easier than ever for you to access the information you need to study and explore life on Earth…for free, anytime, anywhere.

62+ Million Pages of
Biodiversity Literature Online.

EXPLORE

Tools and Services
to Transform Research.

EXPLORE

300,000+
Illustrations on Flickr.

EXPLORE

 

ABOUT | BLOG AUTHORS | HARMFUL CONTENT | PRIVACY | SITE MAP | TERMS OF USE

Download Adobe Acrobat Reader