[SOS-PCA] SOS Call Notes September 1

Tue Sep 1 16:54:23 CDT 2020

Hi all,

Thanks to everyone who attended the call today or sent me an email update. It sounds like despite many challenges this season, most crews have been able to make successful collections, which is amazing!

A couple notes on using the Teams platform since we had a few new people join us, and will be continuing to use this platform going forward:

First, Thursday morning I will be sending out a new recurring event invite for the monthly SOS collector's calls. If you have been on the last 2 monthly calls, I have your email and you will receive an invitation. If you have not joined, or if you know of someone who has not joined, but who should be invited, please send me their contact information.
When Leah and I created last month's call we tried to include everyone on the invitation, but inevitably missed some people. This meant that I have either had to forward many of you the invitation (which for some reason then doesn't save as a recurring invite) or add you to the event (which then sends an update to everyone on the list).
My hope is that by creating a new event, everyone will be included and you will not have to worry about trying to get a hold of me on the day of the meeting! That said, you can always email me if you need help troubleshooting anything and, of course, I can continue to update the participants list after this update :)
When you receive the new invitation, please RSVP "Yes" to the event so that every monthly meeting saves to your calendar.
If you are unable to sync with a calendar for some reason, I will give you the conference phone number and pass code to call in. However, the pass code changes every meeting, so you will need to contact me to receive that every month as it is not something I can share over this listserv.

Second, we have not had any issues with this thus far, but, when we are using Teams, please remain on mute unless you have something to say. With so many people on the call, it would be quite hectic if we were all unmuted. You should all have the ability to unmute yourselves by clicking on the microphone icon on the screen. However, if you have any difficulties with this, please let me know. Also, it has worked well for those of you who do not have a working microphone on your computers to type into the chat, so please continue to feel free doing that!

Here are the September SOS Call Notes:

Reminders:

-SOS web portal: So far the collections entered into the web portal are looking great! Please send me a copy of your first data sheet to review if you have not already done so.

-The deadline for data entry is December 15th. This is also the deadline for submitting your annual reports and photos. A copy of the annual report template is available on the website under "Download the SOS Forms": https://www.blm.gov/programs/natural-resources/native-plant-communities/native-plant-and-seed-material-development/collection

-Photos: Should be sent in one folder - no sub folders please!
Digital photos of the species being collected should always be taken while in the field. At least three photos should be taken for each collection:
1. Landscape Level/Population
2. Individual Plant
3. Material Collected (seed)
The following naming convention should be used for all SOS photos and each photo should be given a unique picture number (A, B, C, etc):
PLANTS Code_Collection Number_Picture Number (EX: POSE_CBG-123_A)

Updates:

-Smithsonian: Still operating at limited capacity, so if you have the ability to hold onto your voucher specimens, please do so!

-Bend: Continue to mail your collections as they are complete. However, a reminder to please only send a collection once you are sure you are done collecting. If you are going to be collecting over multiple days from the same population, hold onto the seed until you are completely done and can send it all at once.

-Asclepias: There was a question about a minimum number of seeds for Asclepias collections. Please try for at least 2,000 seeds.

Our next call will be Tuesday, October 6th.

Take care, and thanks for all of your hard work!

Anna

Anna Lindquist

National Curator, Seeds of Success  (Contractor)

Pronouns: she/her/hers

Seeds of Success<https://www.blm.gov/programs/natural-resources/native-plant-communities/native-plant-and-seed-material-development/collection>

National Seed Strategy<https://www.blm.gov/programs/natural-resources/native-plant-communities/national-seed-strategy>

Plant Conservation Alliance<https://www.blm.gov/programs/natural-resources/native-plant-communities/national-seed-strategy/pca>

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.plantconservation.org/pipermail/sos_lists.plantconservation.org/attachments/20200901/96881b07/attachment.html>