Current Checklist of the Wisconsin Flora
The Excel spreadsheet below contains our current assessment of the entire Wisconsin vascular plant flora. It can be easily downloaded and custom sorted by users. The herbarium curators strive to maintain the most up-to-date and widely accepted taxonomy and nomenclature available using a variety of resources (e.g., Flora of North America treatments, published molecular phylogenetic studies, APG classification system updates, etc.) and will regularly replace this list as new information becomes available. Growth form, WI wetland indicator status, coefficient of conservation, and other information is included.
Spreadsheet for Making Labels and Importing Data into WIS’ Specimen Database
The following Excel spreadsheet allows collectors to enter their specimen data into standard fields so they can be imported quickly into our database, and labels automatically generated.
If you hover over the column headings in the spreadsheet, you will find notes about how information should be entered into each field. For example, it will tell you that dates should be entered as mm/dd/yyyy (04/02/2014), etc. There are also examples given on a second sheet within the file.
If you wish to donate specimens to the State Herbarium, we ask that you try to provide collection data using this format. Please contact one of the curators if you have any questions about the fields or the formatting.
Excel Spreadsheet for Generating Labels
Instructions for using WIS Label Spreadsheet (pdf)
Keys to the Asteraceae of Wisconsin
Written by Dr. Robert Kowal, UW-Madison Botany
available for dowload as a pdf
Orchids of Wisconsin
This is an interactive flora of the native and naturalized orchids of Wisconsin created in 1996 by former graduate student Jeff Hapeman. CD-ROM versions of the website are available for purchase from the Herbarium.
visit the Orchids of Wisconsin
Keys to Sparganium (Typhaceae)
vist the Sparganium research pages
Visual Guides to common species of Wisconsin grasses, bedstraws (Galium), knapweeds (Centaurea), asters, and goldenrods
These are nice pdf documents prepared by Dr. Ken Sytsma at UW-Madison to help students who make plant collections in local flora courses.
Key to Woody Plants of Wisconsin Forests: a Free App for the iPhone
This key provides an easy-to-use tool for identifying Wisconsin trees, shrubs and vines.
The key includes 85 species of trees and 57 species of shrubs and vines that are native to Wisconsin or exotic and invasive.
Download the free app from iTunes
Characteristics of Pollen Collected by Honeybees in the Midwest
Many local beekeepers desire visual tools to allow for plant species identification of pollen collected by their bees. The following Excel spreadsheets were created in 2007 by Linda Lathrop of Laclede County, Missouri and shared with members of the Dane County, Wisconsin Beekeepers Association. They can be sorted by various pollen character types in order to narrow potential species identification. The staff of the WI State Herbarium are working on a more visual and user friendly identification tool. Watch for updates!
Table of Plant Species and Pollen Characteristics
Key to Pollen Characteristics used in the Table of Plant Species