Museum Curation of San Juan River Fish Samples

The purpose of this project is threefold: 1) to process specimens of fish collected for the San Juan River Recovery Implementation Program (SJRIP); 2) capture all field information into an electronic catalog and; 3) incorporate the SJRIP collections into a phylogenetic system in the permanent museum archives. The purpose of this modification is to add one additional staff person to the workgroup to support the workload. This Grant Award is made under the Colorado Plateau Cooperative Ecosystems Studies Unit (CESU) agreement. The United Stated Bureau of Reclamation participates in the CESU under number 9-FG-81-0143. Objectives 1. Provide a secure and organized permanent repository for San Juan River fish collections, field notes, and associated data thereby facilitating access to these resources by SJRIP researchers. 2. Insure that all SJRIP species identifications and associated data are verified and correctly represented in the MSB electronic catalog; report discrepancies to SJRIP principal investigators. 3. Georeferenced collection sites for SJRIP collections; maintain license for ArcView and make collection data available to SJRIP researchers in that format. 4. Modification 003 will add staff to the team in order to accomplish the work load. Place of Performance All activities take place in the Division of Fishes, Museum of Southwestern Biology (MSB), on the University of New Mexico campus in Albuquerque, NM. The MSB division of Fishes has two offices, five computer workstation for data entry, a fully equipped laboratory for preparation of fish collections, and approximately 1,858 linear meters of compacted shelving for storage of cataloged collections. On average, four UNM students are employed to process and curate the SJRIP collections.