Containing over 175,000 accessioned specimens, the mammal collection is world-wide in scope (68 countries) with particularly strong holdings from the Southwest US, Beringia, and Latin America. The collection is taxonomically broad, representing 25 mammalian Orders, with the majority in Rodentia, Chiroptera, Carnivora, and Soricomorpha. The collection is a hub of research activity and training efforts at the University of New Mexico as witnessed through publications, dissertations, honor’s theses, annual growth and continued diversification. Our average annual increase in catalogued specimens is >5,000 and many specimens are loaned to a variety of investigations. Use of the collection has increased tremendously through the utilization of our web-based database, reflecting a new trend in environmental and genomics research that ties other large informatics resources (e.g., GenBank, BerkeleyMapper) to archival collections.

To request a scientific loan of specimens, please contact the Curator. We adhere to American Society of Mammalogists standards with regard to Systematic Collection accreditation and database standards. If users have more specific needs or are having difficulties, please contact any of the collections staff for assistance.

Searchable Web Database of Mammal Collection

The Mammal Division database provides information on vouchered specimens and associated materials (e.g. parasites and tissues) in the Division of Mammals. These data are available in a searchable format with most common searches (e.g., taxonomic or geographic) available to all web-users. Many of the voucher specimens in this collection also have components deposited in the Division of Genomic Resources (DGR) of the MSB. If you are interested in frozen tissues, chromosomes, or related materials go to the DGR page.

History of the Mammal Collection

The Museum of Southwestern Biology (MSB) is a distinct administrative unit of the University of New Mexico Biology Department. The MSB contains collections of national and international significance in all vertebrate classes, invertebrates, plants, and genetic materials. The collections of plants, invertebrates, and vertebrates were housed in Castetter Hall (Biology Building) on the University of New Mexico (UNM) main campus and originated from the collecting efforts of Edward F. Castetter beginning in 1928. Formal management and maintenance of the collections began in 1936 when William J. Koster joined the UNM faculty. The mammal collections grew slowly until 1955 when James S. Findley assumed duties as curator of mammals. Between 1955 and 1978 more than 36,000 specimens were added to the collection. The initial focus of the collection was regional with Findley and his students conducting research on mammals of New Mexico and the southwest. Later, Findley’s group acquired significant collections of mammals from Costa Rica, Panama, Africa, and Mexico. The division also began a major educational program in mammalian ecology and systematics during this period at the graduate and undergraduate levels and sixty students received graduate degrees under the direction of Dr. Findley.

In 1978, Dr. Findley was appointed Chairman of the Biology Department and Director of the MSB and Dr. Terry L. Yates was appointed Curator of Mammals. The hiring of Dr. Yates added new dimensions to the mammal collection. In 1979, the Division of Mammals began saving ancillary collections that would form the beginnings of the Division of Genomic Resources (DGR). These new materials formed the nucleus of what is now the largest collection of frozen mammalian tissues (heart, liver, kidney, spleen, etc.) in the world. A large percentage of the current MSB collection of mammals now consists of “holistic” voucher specimens that include not only skins and skulls, but post cranial skeletons, frozen tissues and in many cases chromosome preparations, frozen cell suspensions, and endo-, ecto-, and protozoan parasites. The parasite material has been archived primarily at the Manter Lab at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, the USDA National Parasite Collection (Beltsville, MD), and the Smithsonian Institution.

Yates and his students added major collections from Japan, much of North America, Scandinavia and from a NSF survey of the mammals of Bolivia in collaboration with the American Museum of Natural History. That project resulted in major additions of Bolivian mammals and later comparative samples from Paraguay, Ecuador, Chile, Costa Rica and Honduras. In 1989, UNM received support to establish a long-term ecological research site (LTER) on the Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge and series of local mammals have been added each year to the MSB collections since that time, accompanied by large amounts of ecological and climatic data.

In 1994, vertebrates from the USGS Biological Surveys Collection in Fort Collins were moved to the MSB. From 1981 to 2006, Dr. Michael Bogan was the Curator of that collection, now called the USGS Biological Resource Division (BRD) Collection. BRD contains over 23,000 specimens of dry and fluid-preserved mammals and is particularly rich in specimens from western Federal lands, especially Nebraska, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico. These collections are currently being integrated into the MSB collection.

More than 90,000 specimens (including federal BRD specimens) were added under Yates’ tenure as Curator (1978-2003).

Dr. Joseph Cook was appointed Curator of Mammals in 2003 and continues the tradition of Findley and Yates through student-based research projects. NSF, NIH, and other federally supported projects are adding new materials from northwestern North America, Asia (including the incomparable Robert Rausch collection) and the Southwest. In 2005, we accessioned a large collection of specimens (>32,750) from the southwestern US, Latin America, and Alaska that had been orphaned from the University of Illinois (Hoffmeister’s collection). With the addition of these holdings, the MSB Division of Mammals ranks fifth among collections of mammals in the Western Hemisphere and second among university-based collections (behind the MVZ at UC Berkeley).

EDUCATION AND OUTREACH

Worldwide, comparatively few training programs in environmental, evolutionary, and biomedical sciences are centered at university museums. Consequently, MSB plays a primary role in using collections-based experiences to train the next generation of investigators in these areas. UNM is a “Minority Serving Institution” and MSB is attracting top high school, undergraduate, and graduate students from diverse ethnic backgrounds to work on collections-based projects.

Graduate Students: A large proportion of the projects supported by MSB specimens are dissertation questions, ca.15 current or recently completed dissertations at UNM and a minimum of 30 dissertations at other institutions (e.g., Texas Tech, UCLA; Oregon State Univ.; Univ. Minnesota) are currently using MSB specimens.

Undergraduate Students: Students on NSF-REUs and in UMEB have participated in field, lab, or museum projects throughout the West and in Latin America. Our specimens support promising undergraduate projects and several recent honors theses have been based in the museum. The collection also serves as lab material in courses such as General Biology, Vertebrate Zoology, Molecular Evolution, and Mammalogy.

High School Students: Minority high school students also worked with support from NSF's program "Research Assistantships for Minority High School Students." Other programs such as "Resource Apprenticeships for Students" (Bureau of Land Management, 9 high school students over 4 years) and federal work-study funds (24 students since 1993) have provided training to many budding scientists. Indeed, many of today's best scientists and scholars began their careers associated with museums and a large number of MSB affiliated students are now professional scientists.

DEVELOPMENT OF ELECTRONIC DATABASES

Specimens at MSB are managed within the ARCTOS (Oracle-based management with a Cold Fusion web interface) system, a database that integrates specimens, scientific results, and extensive collection-management tools to facilitate the use of biological collections. ARCTOS integrates with BerkeleyMapper, GenBank, and GoogleEarth. A DiGIR provider supplies various federated portals (e.g., GBIF). Twenty collections at UC Berkeley, University of Alaska Museum of the North, the MSB, and Western New Mexico University share a multi-hosting version of ARCTOS. Independent clones are under development by the Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology. ARCTOS is largely based on the Collections Information System at the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology.