Maryland Biodiversity Project

The **Maryland Biodiversity Project** (MBP) is a non-profit organization devoted to cataloging every plant, animal, and fungus species found in Maryland - possibly the first attempt to do so for an entire US state. It was launched in June 2012 by Bill Hubick and Jim Brighton and, as of July, 2019, its massive database includes half a million records of 12,360 animal species, 1,105 fungi, and - most relevant to our interests - 3,788 species of plants. In conjunction with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources (DNR) and the University of Maryland's Norton-Brown Herbarium, the MBP also runs the **Maryland Plant Atlas**, which is effectively the same data from the MBP's database displayed in a slightly different format.

## How MBP Works and the Records it Keeps

The MBP is a crowdsourced operation. Much of the ground-level work - taking photos of interesting plants and animals - is done by enthusiastic hobbyists, and a network of editors, many professional naturalists, confirm the sightings. Users collect sightings of living things, mapped geographically to counties and to "quads" (representing the USGS 7.5 minute quadrangle maps; each quad is about half the size of Baltimore City).

### Species Records

Typically, MBP records the locations where a species has been observed and some photos of the species. Some species entries also include a brief paragraph about the species or some information about relationships (e.g. if a plant is the larval host for a particular butterfly). Species records do not include some information that is important to gardeners, including cultivation and sourcing data.

### Record Limitations

While experts are involved, MBP is fundamentally volunteer-run, which means that errors don't always get caught; for instance, typographical errors (e.g. *Carex **aqualitis*** in place of *Carex **aquatilis***) are common throughout the database. However, the photos are typically of excellent quality and the location information is far more granular than almost any other source.

**Please be aware that we must assume that no images from MBP are usable for this wiki.** Unfortunately, though most photos are submitted via Flickr, there are no direct links provided back to the original images on Flickr, which means there's no easy way to check whether the original photographer released the image under a Creative Commons license. The only way to confirm the copyright status is to perform a reverse Google Image Search to find the original Flickr page.

## Data Classification Through Tags

In addition to the basic records, a species may be flagged with one or more tags. These tags are not documented, but they are searchable if the tag ID is known. Currently, the following tags are known to be relevant to plants (all record counts are as of July 10, 2019).

### Population Status according to Federal Government and Maryland

* A series of tags apparently based on federal and state endangered and threatened lists:
	+ Maryland endangered plants (253 records)
	+ Maryland threatened plants (70 records)
	+ Federally endangered plants (4 records)
	+ Federally threatened plants (3 records)

### Population Status according to the Maryland Department of Natural Resources

* A series of tags apparently based on DNR rank and status codes:
	+ S1: highly state rare plants (316 records)
	+ S1S2: highly state rare plants (19 records). It is unclear what this tag means; it may be a typo or it may refer to plants that are on the cusp between the S1 list and the S2 list.
	+ S2: state rare plants (118 records)
	+ S2S3: state rare plants (21 records). Meaning or parameters unclear.
	+ S3: watchlist plants (147 records)
	+ S3S4 (9 records). Meaning or parameters unclear.
	+ S4SE (1 record). This might mean "securely established in Maryland but not native to Maryland", though the one plant in the list is not tagged as non-native.
	+ SH: historical plants (14 records). These are plants that were known to exist in Maryland but haven't been recorded in at least 20 years.
	+ G1: highly globally rare plants (3 records)
	+ G2: globally rare plants (7 records)
	+ G3: globally rare/local plants (15 records). The DNR defines G3 as meaning "either very rare and local throughout its range or distributed locally (even abundantly at some of its locations) in a restricted range (e.g., a single western stare, a physiographic region in the East) or because of other factors making it vulnerable to extinction throughout its range; typically with 21 to 100 estimated occurrences."

### Locations Found

* A series of tags based on regions and counties where the plant is uniquely found. It is unknown where the data sources for these tags are.
	+ Western MD only plants (5 records)
	+ Garrett County only plants (2 records)
	+ Coastal plain only plants (6 records)
	+ Worcester County only plants (2 records)

### Miscellaneous Tags

* A series of tags with unknown data sources.These tags appear to be applied at the discretion of editors, though it's possible they were derived from lists that are simply uncited.
	+ Extinct plants (1 record)
	+ Extirpated plants (73 records). "Extirpated", in this context, means "extinct in Maryland but still found in other places".
	+ Vulnerable plants (33 records)
	+ Invasive plants (102 records)
	+ Waif plants (262 records). A waif is a species that occasionally occurs in Maryland but can't establish a self-sustaining naturalized population here.
	+ Adventive plants (2 records). The term "adventive" has more than one meaning, but MBP appears to be using it in the sense of plants which have spread beyond their native range due to environmental changes without being introduced by humans.
	+ Exotic plants (5 records). It is not clear what definition MBP is using for exotic, nor what the data source for this tag is.
	+ Non-native plants (1,077 records)
	+ Excluded plants (3 records). Meaning or parameters unclear.
	+ Status uncertain plants (23 records). Meaning or parameters unclear.

### Classification Limitations

Because no explanation of these tags is given, because any lists that underlie the tags are not consistently cited, and because there is no apparent tracking of which editor applied a given tag, gardeners are cautioned against treating MBP's classification of plants through tags as scientific or legal fact (though they can, and should, prompt a deeper investigation). This may change if MBP begins requiring editors to add citations or other information supporting their choices of tags. (MBP does have a general bibliography page for the entire site.)

Because of these issues, please be aware that, **where other reputable data sources conflict with MBP, this wiki may not agree with its classifications.**

 For example, purple passionflower (*Passiflora incarnata*, also known as maypop) is listed as a non-native plant by the MBP. However, several other sources indicate that purple passionflower *is* indigenous to this area - it is native to the southeastern United States, its native range is not separated from Maryland by any significant geographic barrier, it is found wild in Maryland, and other sources (like BONAP and iNaturalist) consider it a Maryland native.

## Getting Involved

The MBP is donation-funded and relies entirely on volunteer labor. They ask that interested parties join their Facebook group and share photos to their Flickr group. Further ways to assist the project are listed on their site.

## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 Thompson, Jay R (2013-09-08). "Tracking Maryland's biodiversity, one creature at a time". Baltimore Sun. Retrieved 10 July 2019 from an archived copy at marylandbiodiversity.com.
2. ↑ "Key Partners and Contributors". Maryland Plant Atlas Work Group. 2016. Digital Atlas of the Maryland Flora. Retrieved 2019-07-10.
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 "Explanation of Rank and Status Codes (PDF)". Maryland Department of Natural Resources (2007-12-20). Retrieved 2019-07-10.
4. ↑ "Bibliography". Maryland Biodiversity Project. Retrieved 2019-07-10.
5. ↑ "Passiflora incarnata". iNaturalist. Retrieved 2019-07-19.
6. ↑ "Want to help?". Maryland Biodiversity Project. Retrieved 2019-07-10.