Journeys
The expeditions, reassembled
Every dated label is a diary entry. Read a collector’s labels in order and the voyage comes back: the islands in sequence, the days at each, the specimens from every stop. 3 journeys so far, 1940 to 1947, 2,234 specimens between them.
3 collectors and expeditions95 days in the field26,314 km between stops1,149 photographed specimens
3 journeys match
Otto Degener
5 islands of Fiji · Nov 1940 – Jul 1941
Otto Degener across 5 islands of Fiji, November 1940 – July 19411,263 specimens · 59 stops · 237 days · 15,888 km
Albert C. Smith
3 islands of Fiji · Oct – Dec 1947
Albert C. Smith in Vanua Levu, Macuata and Fiji, October – December 1947527 specimens · 16 stops · 69 days
E. Ordonez
5 islands of Fiji · Nov 1940 – Jan 1941
E. Ordonez across 5 islands of Fiji, November 1940 – January 1941444 specimens · 14 stops · 70 days · 10,426 km
How a journey is found
Every specimen with a full date and a known collector is a diary entry. The days are read in order; a gap of more than three weeks ends one journey and starts the next. Days spent where a collector lived most of their life are home, not travel, and are left out.
A journey needs at least five days, forty specimens and two places. Within it, a run of days spent within about ten kilometres is one stop; the stop’s point is the middle of the labels that carry coordinates, or the island’s centre when none do.
Companions are the people whose own labels put them in the same place on the same days. Staff can name a journey, write about it and feature it; everything else here is read straight off the specimens, and is rebuilt as the records improve.