Decipher our collections,
discover hidden archives
and contribute to knowledge

Euphorbiaceae, or the Spurge family, is a large family with a global distribution. In this expedition we will be exploring the Euphorbiacae of Britain and Ireland.

In Britain and Ireland there are two genera Mercurialis and Euphorbia. Euphorbia's have a unique floral structure called a cyathium. The Cyathium od formed of fused bracts around a ring of stamens and nectar glands, with a pistil at the centre.

The collections from Britain and Ireland held within the RBGE Herbarium are estimated to number over 500,000 specimens of cryptogams (algae, fungi, lichens and mosses), ferns, gymnosperms and flowering plants. In 2021 we began to increase our in-house digitisation capacity with the aim of completing the digitisation of its 3 million specimens in a 5-year programme (2021-2025). The next series of expeditions seek to complement this body of work by enriching the basic online catalogue records produced by the in-house digitisation team with specimen label data.

The Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh’s extensive Herbarium numbers nearly three million specimens representing half to two thirds of the world's flora. It is considered a leading botanical collection, and every year many researchers from around the world visit to study our specimens.