'U' curators travel south to aid in museum clean-up

When Hurricane Georges hit the Carribean with destructive force in late September, island inhabitants were not the only ones left without shelter. Much of the Dominican Republic's natural history and plant collections were damaged.

As part of the clean-up effort, two University curators traveled to Santo Domingo to assess the losses accumulated by the National Botanical Gardens and the National Museum of Natural History.

Iñigo de la Cerda, assistant curator of the University Herbarium, witnessed the damage done to the botanical gardens, which lost many exotic species of plants and trees to the 180 to 200 kilometers per hour winds.

While most of the trees in the gardens were uprooted, many of the collections housed inside of greenhouses, including a wide variety of orchids, were saved by being stored safely before the structures were destroyed.

The Center for Marine Conservation, a private environmental protection foundation based in Washington, D.C., funded de la Cerda and Zoology Prof. Phillip Myers, associate curator of the Museum of Zoology, as part of a $50,000 grant to help repair the hurricane's devastation.

"In general, it's important to us to protect biodiversity in the Carribean," said Michael Smith, director of the Carribean Biodiversity Program. "When the hurricane hit, it did a lot of damage to institutions we support."

Most of the Dominican Republic was left without power, and an estimated 2,000 inhabitants died from flooding. The storm also transformed the island's appearance.

"Walking along the streets was really devastating," de la Cerda said. "Santo Domingo is a city with a lot of very old trees. In terms of economic and social damage, it was terrible."

While de la Cerda visited the botanical gardens, Myers observed the ravages the storm had wrought on the Museum of National History, which houses a large research collection of preserved species.

"Research collections are what is important to support conservation efforts," Myers said.

In addition to structural damage, the museum suffered from water cascading down the stairs from the roof and flooding the basement, where many of the preserved insect and fish specimens were housed.

With CMC funding, the museum already has rebuilt a wall that threatened the stability of the building. In addition, the CMC is shipping basic supplies such as cabinets, alcohol and jars to preserve specimens.

Another problem the museum and botanical gardens faced was that many members of their staffs were preoccupied with having lost their homes to the hurricane.

The recent cooperation between the CMC and the University was not the first time the two organizations worked together. The CMC currently collaborates with the University in a joint effort to promote conservation efforts in Cuba.

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