World Museum Liverpool

 It is often inspiring to visit other herbaria.  To get a feel of another collection of pressed plant specimens, to discuss which acid free paper or archival quality glue should be used, to explore how others deal with unincorporated material or oversized specimens.

And so a group of us from Manchester visited the botany team at the herbarium at World Museum Liverpool.   

   We have been working on our spirit specimens in Manchester recently so were very interested in Liverpool’s spirit store and new jars.

     

Liverpool Herbarium is incredibly rich in historical specimens.  This is one collected by William Roscoe, a successful Liverpool lawyer and politician whose interests included history, poetry, botany, languages and art.  He was the founder of the Liverpool Botanic Garden.

This specimen is of a plant named after Roscoe: Roscoea purpurea.  Grown in the Liverpool Botanic Gardens, this specimen was taken in 1823 and is in the ginger family.  It is native to the Himalayas.

 Roscoea purpurea growing wild.