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talk · Thursday 24 September · 16:12–⁠16:24 · SAL A

The Unruliness of Higher Geography: What is it doing for us?

Erica Krimmel · Solutions for Research Collection Management Systems Challenges

Recording time 8:38:22–8:49:52Open on Vimeo ↗

Summaries and key moments are machine-produced. Check the recording for the speaker’s exact words.

The short versionDarwin Core needs more explicit, time-aware ways to share human and physical geography so data without coordinates can still be discovered and used.

Overview

What this was about

Erika Krimmel argued that Darwin Core's handling of higher geography is unruly. The dwc:higherGeography term is loosely defined and often a concatenation of other fields. Physical geography (oceans, drainage basins, mountain ranges) and many human regions (parks, EEZs, historical countries) lack explicit terms. A US freshwater mussel study used only georeferenced records and so missed 51% of the data, even though many historic records named drainages precisely enough for the question. GBIF indexes higherGeography and waterBody as text, so finding Atlantic Ocean records takes several searches. Boundary changes over time (Valencia/Cibola County, New Mexico) add confusion. She proposed a Darwin Core Maintenance Group task group.

Why it matters. Much historic specimen data can't be georeferenced but has meaningful higher geography. Better terms could unlock it for conservation research.

Key ideas

In the room

  • Higher geography contextualises localities and is a useful first-pass filter.
  • dwc:higherGeography is open to interpretation and becomes a 'trash basket or treasure trove'.
  • Physical geography is treated much less explicitly than human geography in Darwin Core.
  • Freshwater mussel study: 51% of records (ungeoreferenced historic specimens, including a holotype) were excluded despite having drainage information.
  • GBIF indexes higherGeography and waterBody as text strings, so concept-based search (e.g. Atlantic Ocean) needs several queries.
  • Geography changes over time (e.g. Cibola County carved from Valencia County in 1981), so concepts are most useful with a time.
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Transcript

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Programme abstract

The Unruliness of Higher Geography: What is it doing for us?

Erica Krimmel

In natural science collections, the concept of a collecting locality intermixes human and physical geography. This breadth is necessary to facilitate sharing location information, not only for research but also to ensure legal compliance and to encourage ethical practices. Geography is a primary facet for discovery and analysis of collections-based data, and we increasingly need ways to share geographic data accurately regardless of how precise it is. For example, a mollusk specimen collected from a given watershed in 2020 likely has location data that includes precise coordinates recorded from a GPS unit, and a mollusk specimen collected in 1920 may only have the watershed recorded, but either way, “watershed” may be the most useful concept. Geography is fluid, no matter what flavor of geography is being considered. Maps get redrawn and tectonic plates move, which means that geographic concepts are most useful when associated with time.

In this talk, we review existing conceptual models for capturing and sharing geographic information from common Collections Management Systems, data standards, and data aggregators. We then highlight pain points within these models, and illustrate their impact on discoverability. For example, although the “Atlantic Ocean” is a fundamental geographic concept, finding specimens that were collected in the Atlantic Ocean can be challenging. These pain points are connected by a throughline of forcing physical and administrative geographies together. We close by suggesting the need for a new TDWG task group under the Darwin Core Maintenance Group to assess the current terms and recommend modifications or additions.

Submitted to the conference programme before the talk, so the talk itself may differ.