Organization and the feasible format of a ’large’ Flora

In this age of vanishing natural resources, where we are witness to the final acts, or perhaps better said, the last scenes of the last act, of the destruction of our natural heritage on a global scale, it becomes ever more important to record for posterity the diversity of life that has existed on our planet. There have been numerous floras produced, of course. Nearly every geographic and political region of the world has had some success, in most cases very limited, however, in providing inventories of their most important natural heritage – their assemblages of native plants. Some of these attempts have been less than successful because they have been based on an unspoken but omnipresent principle that time is not an issue; that it is not a constant, and that one should strive for the most thorough product regardless of the amount of time necessary to do it. I take the position here that time is not a variable in the organization and management of large floras, and that such projects have to be based on strong management principles. I take the position that the real problem in the production of floras is not the scientific content, but the management of the people and the resources that are mobilized to achieve the objective in a given amount of time. When one is racing the clock, time is the least expendable of the variables we have. It is for this reason that I propose that large floras must be organized so that there are clearly defined goals achieved within a specific time. I provide a set of basic premises or axioms with which large flora projects should be organized.