Plant species occurrences recorded from selected sites in the upper Tana River Basin, Kenya

Latest version published by National Museums of Kenya on Sep 10, 2019 National Museums of Kenya

The dataset contains plant species occurrences recorded during fieldwork carried out from 2018 to 2019 in selected sites in Nyeri, Meru, Embu, Murang’a, Tharaka Nithi and Kiambu Counties all in the Upper Tana River Basin, Kenya. The sites included: Kiang’ondu Forest; Ngaya Forest; Kijegge Hill; Kathithini, Kamanyathi Location; Nkorongo River, Mwonyonzi, Chiakariga Location; Kiang’ombe Hill; Thegu, Gura, Sagana, Mathioya, Maragua, Channia, Chania and Thika Rivers; Gathabara, Mbuguti,and Mitai streams as well as Kimakia Forest in the Aberdares. The plants species were mainly identified on site to species level and documented as site records. However, in a few cases, voucher specimens were collected for confirmation and preservation at the East African Herbarium (EA), National Museums of Kenya, Nairobi. Geo-references were taken on site using a Garmin GPSMAP64s.

Data Records

The data in this occurrence resource has been published as a Darwin Core Archive (DwC-A), which is a standardized format for sharing biodiversity data as a set of one or more data tables. The core data table contains 3,944 records.

This IPT archives the data and thus serves as the data repository. The data and resource metadata are available for download in the downloads section. The versions table lists other versions of the resource that have been made publicly available and allows tracking changes made to the resource over time.

Downloads

Download the latest version of this resource data as a Darwin Core Archive (DwC-A) or the resource metadata as EML or RTF:

Data as a DwC-A file download 3,944 records in English (110 KB) - Update frequency: unknown
Metadata as an EML file download in English (20 KB)
Metadata as an RTF file download in English (12 KB)

Versions

The table below shows only published versions of the resource that are publicly accessible.

How to cite

Researchers should cite this work as follows:

Masinde S, Matheka K, Atieno D, Odhiambo K, Nyange M, Kamau P (2019): Plant species occurrences recorded from selected sites in the upper Tana River Basin, Kenya. v1.0. National Museums of Kenya. Dataset/Occurrence. http://ipt.museums.or.ke/ipt/resource?r=trb_plants&v=1.0

Rights

Researchers should respect the following rights statement:

The publisher and rights holder of this work is National Museums of Kenya. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC-BY-NC) 4.0 License.

GBIF Registration

This resource has been registered with GBIF, and assigned the following GBIF UUID: 718d628f-149a-4789-a062-05415f042c40.  National Museums of Kenya publishes this resource, and is itself registered in GBIF as a data publisher endorsed by GBIF Kenya.

Keywords

Vascular plants; species occurrence; herbarium specimen; site records; human observation; Upper Tana; Tana River Basin; National Museums of Kenya; Kenya; Observation

Contacts

Who created the resource:

Siro Masinde
Principal Research Scientist
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE +254 3742161
http://www.museums.or.ke
Kennedy Matheka
Taxonomist
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE
Dorothy Atieno
Project Digitizer
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE
Kevin Odhiambo
Project Assistant
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE
Mwadime Nyange
Taxonomist
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE
Peris Kamau
Senior Research Scientist
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE
http://www.museums.or.ke

Who can answer questions about the resource:

Siro Masinde
Principal Research Scientist
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE +254 3742161
http://www.museums.or.ke
Peris Kamau
Senior Research Scientist
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE
http://www.museums.or.ke
Kennedy Matheka
Taxonomist
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE
http://www.museums.or.ke
Mwadime Nyange
Taxonomist
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi
http://www.museums.or.ke
Dorothy Atieno
Project Digitizer
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE
Kevin Odhiambo
Project Assistant
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE

Who filled in the metadata:

Siro Masinde
Principal Research Scientist
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE +254 3742161
http://www.museums.or.ke
Peris Kamau
Senior Research Scientist
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE
http://www.museums.or.ke

Who else was associated with the resource:

Processor
Esther Mwangi
Research Scientist
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE
http://www.museums.or.ke
Publisher
Lawrence Monda
ICT Manager
National Museums of Kenya Museum Hill Road P. O. Box 40658 - 00100 Nairobi Nairobi KE
http://www.museums.or.ke

Geographic Coverage

Tana River Basin, south eastern Kenya

Bounding Coordinates South West [-2.011, 38.429], North East [0.015, 40.25]

Taxonomic Coverage

Vascular plants mostly identified to species level

Phylum  Tracheophyta (Vascular plants including ferns and flowering plants)

Temporal Coverage

Start Date / End Date 2019-05-07 / 2019-07-02

Project Data

No Description available

Title Developing a Freshwater Biodiversity Information System for the Tana River Basin, Kenya, for Improved Ecosystem Management and Development Planning.
Identifier 60704 JRS-NMK
Funding JRS Biodiversity Foundation - https://jrsbiodiversity.org/
Study Area Description Tana River Basin is located in south eastern Kenya approximately between latitudes 0°0’53” and 2°0’41’’ South, and longitudes 38°25’43” and 40°15’ East, covering an area of about 95,000 km2 (Baker et al 2015). It is bordered by the Ewaso Ng’iro North Catchment to the north, the Rift Valley to the west, Athi Basin to the south and Somalia and the Indian Ocean to the east. The Tana River winds from its headwaters in the forests of Mount Kenya and the Nyandarua Ranges including the Aberdares and rapidly descends down the mountain slopes where there is intensive agriculture, then through the arid and semi-arid areas rangelands and finally terminates in a large delta at the Indian Ocean. The basin is generally divided into three distinct ecosystems that are recognized based on their elevation, climate and vegetation cover (Van Beukering and De Moel, 2015). The upper catchment above 1000 m a.s.l. consists of forested regions with high relief and higher rainfall. There is intensive agriculture in most parts of the upper Catchment. The middle catchment between 300-1000 m is flatter, drier and semi-arid to arid with rangelands that support pastoralism. The lower catchment below 300 m a.s.l. is semi-arid to moist at the coast with dry coastal forests and mangroves swamps and forms a delta with a large floodplain before discharging into the Indian Ocean.
Design Description Line transects and opportunistic sampling was used in surveying..

The personnel involved in the project:

Principal Investigator
Siro Masinde
Peris Kamau
Kevin Odhiambo
Dorothy Atieno
Processor
Esther Mwangi

Sampling Methods

Line transects and opportunistic collections

Study Extent The dataset was recorded between May 7th to July 2nd 2019.
Quality Control Species identification was done on site by a team of scientists and technicians from the East African Herbarium. For difficult or interesting taxa (rare, endemic, underrepresented in the herbarium), voucher specimens were collected for confirmation and for permanent preservation at the East African Herbarium (EA).

Method step description:

  1. Different habitats types were identified, including forests, wetlands, bushlands and riverine areas. Sampling for occurrences was carried out along straight line transects Opportunistic sampling was also carried out to try and document the complete diversity of the plants in a given site. All georeferences were taken in the field with a Garmin GPSMAP64s recorder and locality descriptions described with the help of local people on site.

Bibliographic Citations

  1. Baker, T.; Kiptala, J.; Olaka, L.; Oates, N.; Hussain, A.; McCartney, M. 2015. Baseline review and ecosystem services assessment of the Tana River Basin, Kenya. Colombo, Sri Lanka: International Water Management Institute (IWMI). 107p. (IWMI Working Paper 165) https://dx.doi.org/10.5337/2015.223
  2. Van Beukering, P; De Moel, H. (eds) (2015). The Economics of Ecosystem Services of the Tana River Basin. Available at https://www.ivm.vu.nl/en/Images/R15-03_Tana_River_Basin_TEEB_report_tcm234-757604.pdf

Additional Metadata

Purpose The dataset was created as a contribution of plant occurrence data to the Tana River Basin Biodiversity Information System portal
Alternative Identifiers http://ipt.museums.or.ke/ipt/resource?r=trb_plants