[Nhcoll-l] Advocate for the future of the US National Fungus Collections

[Bentley, Andrew Charles]

Alison

You may be interested in some of the sustainability and community collaboration discussions that are going on at the iDigBio Digital Data conference<https://events.zoom.us/ev/Aifs2F4FYj-AMdSXZZ1uRq47AgWVjZGdR040MyHfv_gDdYVQc5Z_~AgMNQwYdwFOW4vc08eAy6pa4Xhi5Qg0tRrw3tezXQ70bqsGV-wZ6OHsUfA> currently.  There is much discussion of community sustainability and curial infrastructure and how we are stronger as a community than individually.  Rather than having isolated discussions about how we can sustain individual projects, institutions, etc. we should be thinking about unifying efforts around funding what we consider to be critical infrastructure in support of biological research. Presentations are being recorded and will be made available.

Andy

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Andy Bentley
Ichthyology Collection Manager
University of Kansas
Biodiversity Institute
Dyche Hall
1345 Jayhawk Boulevard
Lawrence, KS, 66045-7561
USA

Tel: (785) 864-3863<tel:%28785%29%20864-3863>
Fax: (785) 864-5335<tel:%28785%29%20864-5335>
Email: abentley at ku.edu<mailto:abentley at ku.edu>
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3093-1258
http://ichthyology.biodiversity.ku.edu<http://ichthyology.biodiversity.ku.edu/>
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From: Nhcoll-l <nhcoll-l-bounces at mailman.yale.edu> on behalf of Alison H. Harrington <alisonhh at umich.edu>
Date: Thursday, June 4, 2026 at 10:46 AM
To: nhcoll-l at mailman.yale.edu <nhcoll-l at mailman.yale.edu>
Subject: [Nhcoll-l] Advocate for the future of the US National Fungus Collections

Hi NHColl,

As you may have heard, the USDA Beltsville Agricultural Research Center (BARC) in Maryland is slated for reorganization and dispersal across other USDA hubs across the country. Although this sparse-on-details plan<https://www.usda.gov/ree/reorganization> brings up many legitimate concerns, the fungal collections community want to highlight that the US National Fungus Collections<https://www.ars.usda.gov/northeast-area/beltsville-md-barc/beltsville-agricultural-research-center/mycology-and-nematology-genetic-diversity-and-biology-laboratory/docs/us-national-fungus-collections-bpi/us-national-fungus-collections-databases/>, one of the largest natural history collections of fungi in the world and the mycology/plant pathology equivalent of a collection in the Smithsonian Institution, is managed by the USDA and is housed in BARC.

The USDA reorganization plan does not contain any specific information about the fate of these critical collections, which are already suffering from limited federal funding, leading to fears that this resource of over a million specimens will fall into neglect and disrepair following loss of staff and a wildly underfunded and poorly planned move to a yet-undisclosed location.

In September 2025, the Natural Science Collections Alliance released a statement<https://nscalliance.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/NSCA-Comments-on-BARC-Closure-Collections-Relocation_091225.pdf> expressing concern about the potential impact the proposed BARC relocation would have on the collections housed there, and offered expertise to inform planning related to the future of the collections. However, no further details have emerged.

The Mycological Society of America recently released a statement<https://files.constantcontact.com/8b73de79701/bd90f37f-8a4e-4148-979f-1219bad3ad0f.pdf?rdr=true> of support for the US National Fungus Collections, which emphasized the importance of the collections to the agricultural security of the United States and requested additional support for the collections.

Yet, we still have no information about what might happen to these collections or the associated staff, and it is unclear if the collections have been subject to any consideration in the USDA reorganization.

Please consider reaching out to your representatives to express your concern for the fate of this collection and demand transparency in planning for its future: https://www.congress.gov/members/find-your-member.

Please sign and share this petition that briefly outlines the concerns about the impact of the reorganization and requests transparency and support for the collections: https://www.change.org/p/preserve-and-support-the-u-s-national-fungus-collections.

Thanks for your consideration,
Alison, on behalf of the Mycological Society of America ad hoc Committee on Fungal Collections

--
Alison H. Harrington, PhD
Research Collections Manager | Fungi, Lichens, Bryophytes
University of Michigan Herbarium (MICH) | Research Museums Center
3600 Varsity Drive #1042 | Ann Arbor, MI 48108-2228
Collection of Zoosporic Eufungi at UM (CZEUM) | czeum.herb.lsa.umich.edu<http://czeum.herb.lsa.umich.edu/>
alisonhh at umich.edu<mailto:alisonhh at umich.edu> | 734.936.8028
Donate here to support the fungal collections<https://giving.umich.edu/um/w/fungi-collection-support-fund-386802>!
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