Barbara Ertter Curator of Western North American Flora Collections Manager 1001 Valley Life Sciences Bldg. #2465 Berkeley, CA 94720-2465 (510)642-2465 ertter@berkeley.edu

Curriculum Vitae

As a fourth-generation Idaho native, Dr. Barbara Ertter is a committed Westerner, whose ties to California include a '49er great-great-grandfather. After growing up in the sagebrush and ponderosa pine of southwestern and central Idaho, she attended [Albertson] College of Idaho. Her incipient interest in western floristics was solidified by being part of the group that discovered the botanical treasures of Leslie Gulch in eastern Oregon, under the tutelage of Patricia L. Packard, followed by two summers of vegetation mapping for the Idaho Fish & Game Department. She pursued this interest by choosing to work with the authors of Intermountain Flora, first with James L. Reveal in Maryland (M.S. on Oxytheca) and then with Arthur Cronquest at the New York Botanical Garden (Ph.D. on the Juncus triformis complex). Her return migration to the West began as curator at the University of Texas at Austin, where she oversaw the move of the herbarium to its current quarters. This expertise served her well when the westward pull brought her to Berkeley, where a renovation of the University and Jepson Herbaria had just begun, a process that would last 10 years and involve 3 separate herbarium designs and moves.

Barbara Ertter is Curator of Western North American Flora. She fields botanical queries directed to the herbarium from members of the University, the scientific community at large, and the general public. She served on the NSF Biotic Inventories panel in February 2000, was chair of the Rare Plant Scientific Advisory Committee of the California Native Plant Society, and president of the East Bay Chapter of CNPS in 2000-2001.

Ertter's research concentrates on four broad subjects:

• Western Floristics:
  · Flora of East Bay
  · Diablo Flora project -- updated version of M.L. Bowerman's classic Flowering Plants and Ferns of Mt. Diablo (scheduled release November 2002)
• Systematics:
  · Systematic research on the ivesioid Potentilleae
  · Collaboration on Rosa in North America with Walter Lewis (Washington University, St. Louis) and Anne Bruneau (University of Montreal). A website on California species (ucjeps.berkeley.edu/california_wild_roses.html), intended to further the concept of online monographs created by specialists, was developed by Ertter in 2001-2002.
  · Continued involvement with the World Monograph Juncaceae project of Species Plantarum (primarily in providing material from California and in reviewing manuscript). Two workshops on California Juncaceae were offered during this period, resulting in an improved key (posted at http://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/jk.html).
• Botanical History:
  · A website on Carl Albert Purpus (ucjeps.berkeley.edu/Purpus/index.html), developed with Tom Schweich, Arnold (Jerry) Tiehm, and Richard Beidleman, has been expanded with the inclusion of photographs and articles on Purpus's collecting activities in Colorado, Arizona, and Baja California.
  · Ongoing research on the first few generation of resident botanists in California
• Iran:
  · Dr. Fosiee Tahbaz and Ertter spent 3 weeks in May 1999 in Iran, lecturing at the host universities, meeting with faculty, staff, and students, and collecting plants (overview posted at http://ucjeps.berkeley.edu/iran.html). Funding for for return visits to Iran in fall 2002 and spring 2003 was obtained from National Geographic Society.

Selected Publications (see long CV for full list) :

1986. The Juncus triformis complex. Mem. N.Y. Bot. Gard. 39: 1-90.

1989. Revisionary studies in Ivesia (Rosaceae: Potentilleae). Syst. Bot. 14: 231-244.

1992. A re-evaluation of Potentilla drummondii and P. breweri (Rosaceae), with the new species Potentilla morefieldii. Brittonia: 44: 429- 435.

1992. Neviusia cliftonii (Rosaceae: Kerriae), an intriguing new species from California. Novon 2: 285-289. (with J. Shevock and D. Taylor)

1993. A re-evaluation of the Horkelia bolanderi (Rosaceae) complex, with the new species Horkelia yadonii. Syst. Bot. 18: 137-144.

1993 [1992]. Floristic regions of Idaho. J. Idaho Acad. Sci. 28(2): 57-70. (with B. Moseley)

1995. The changing face of California botany. Madroño 42: 114-122.

1997. Annotated checklist of the East Bay Flora: native and naturalized vascular plants of Alameda and Contra Costa counties, California. Special Publication No. 3 of the California Native Plant Society, East Bay Chapter. 114 pp.

2000. Floristic Surprises in North America North of Mexico Annals of the Missouri Botanical Garden 87: 81--109.

Web Publications

Carl Albert Purpus, Plant Collector in Western America

Botanical Expedition to Iran

California Wild Roses (Draft: February 2002)