Deliverable · seed image and trait reference library
What a reference record looks like
The identification tool is only as good as what it compares against. This is the record it compares against — three imaged orientations and a set of measurements, in the exact form SeedsOfHawaii already uses for every native species in the collection.
Matching that form is the point. A new non-native reference record built to the same schema is directly comparable with the native records already there, which is what lets an unknown seed be checked against both at once.
A record that already exists
See it on SeedsOfHawaii.org →
Close-up
One seed, filling the frame, focus-stacked. This is where surface texture, hilum position and sculpturing are legible — the characters that separate close relatives.
Pair
Two seeds, usually showing different faces. Many seeds are flattened on one side where they pressed against a neighbour, and a single view hides that.
Cluster
Several seeds together at lower magnification. Shows the range of size and colour within one collection, which a single specimen never does.
Images © Lyon Arboretum Rare Plant Program Seeds Lab, served from SeedsOfHawaii.org. Nothing is copied here.
Dodonaea viscosa
Sapindaceae · aʻaliʻi, aʻaliʻi kū makani · Indigenous
- 2.01–2.13 mm
- length
- 1.92–2.05 mm
- width
- 2.08–4.47 mg
- mass
- Round, Ovate or obovate
- 2D shape
- Subglobose / ellipsoid
- 3D shape
- Glabrous
- texture
Two millimetres across, weighing two to four milligrams. Those numbers are why measurement matters: a dozen species on the priority list are round, brown and roughly this size, and mass and a tenth of a millimetre separate them when shape cannot.
The imaging standard
At least three focus-stacked orientations per species, plus ordinary phone-camera images representing what a user will actually photograph. The two are not interchangeable and both are needed: the stacked images are the reference a model learns from, and the phone images are what it will be asked about at a loading dock in poor light.
- 01
Close-up
One seed, filling the frame, focus-stacked. This is where surface texture, hilum position and sculpturing are legible — the characters that separate close relatives.
- 02
Pair
Two seeds, usually showing different faces. Many seeds are flattened on one side where they pressed against a neighbour, and a single view hides that.
- 03
Cluster
Several seeds together at lower magnification. Shows the range of size and colour within one collection, which a single specimen never does.
Why focus stacking
A seed two millimetres across, photographed close enough to show its surface, has a depth of field thinner than the seed itself. One exposure is sharp across a band and blurred everywhere else. Stacking combines many exposures at different focal depths into one image that is sharp throughout — which is the difference between a photograph of a seed and a usable reference.
What gets recorded
Length (mm)
Minimum and maximum across the measured sample.
Width (mm)
Minimum and maximum across the measured sample.
Mass (mg)
Minimum and maximum. Mass separates species that look alike.
2D shape
Controlled vocabulary, eight terms.
3D shape
Controlled vocabulary, eleven terms.
Texture
Surface character at magnification.
Storage behaviour
Whether the seed can be banked, and how.
Island distribution
Which islands the species is recorded from.
Native status
Endemic, indigenous, naturalised or cultivated.
The shape vocabulary
Nineteen terms, already in use across the collection. The key on the identification page asks its questions in exactly these words, so an answer given by an inspector and a record written by a seed lab mean the same thing.
Two-dimensional outline
Bean-shaped (reniform)
Resembling the shape of a kidney or bean.
Square or oblong
Angular shape with all sides more or less equal, or longer than wide.
Triangular
Three-sided shape, broadest below the middle.
Elliptic
Rounded at both ends, shaped like an ellipse or oval.
Ovate or obovate
Egg-shaped, broader at one end.
Linear
Extremely long and narrow, with sides usually parallel.
Round
Appears circular, with length and width roughly the same.
Cardioid (heart-shaped)
One edge has a prominent double curve into two lobes.
Three-dimensional form
Cylindrical
A cylinder with parallel sides and a circular cross-section.
Discoid
Resembling a disc or plate with two relatively flat surfaces.
Fusiform
Spindle-shaped, tapering at both ends.
Globose
Spherical.
Lenticular
Resembling a lens with two convex surfaces.
Ovoid
Egg-shaped.
Plano-convex
A flat ventral surface and a curved dorsal surface.
Polygonal
Having more than three flat faces meeting at angles.
Sectoroid
Like a segment of an orange: two flat faces and one curved face.
Subglobose / ellipsoid
Inflated shape, but less than spherical.
Trigonous
Three faces meeting at a distinct angle; triangular in cross-section.
Native and non-native, side by side
The collection already holds records like the one above for Hawaiian native species. The funded work adds 100 priority invasive and high-risk species to the same standard — so an unknown seed is checked against both sets at once, and an inspector can tell a native from an incursion rather than only ruling one in.