Fort Collins, Colorado, USA
February 16, 2010

SEED IMAGES is a unique website of seed photos established by the SEED TECHNOL-OGISTS EDUCATIONAL PROGRAM (STEP) at Colorado State University in 2002 to help the seed analyst and anyone in the seed industry identify unknown or questionable seeds. It has undergone many changes and improvements during its 8 year history. Many new photos with seed descriptions have been added as well as a finely tuned search engine.

SEED IMAGES now contains over 1700 full color images of native, crop and weed seeds along with written descriptions of the species. Some of the features of the website are: 1. Magnifica-tions of 100X for ease of identification. 2. The site has a user friendly search mechanism for many different seed characteristics including size, shape, color and texture. 3. Identification is by scientific and common names. 4. Species included are agricultural grain, forage, vegetable, tree, shrub, herb, flower and state & federal noxious weeds.

One of the most useful options in the SEED IMAGES database is the Seed Comparison Tool that allows one to identify seeds that look similar by showing two different seeds side-by-side on the same screen. SEED IMAGES is in the process of adding a large number of tree, vegetable and range species to the photo collection. A video demonstration of how the database works can be seen by going to SeedImages.com and clicking on the "Seed Database Demo" link. SEED IMAGES is a virtual seed herbarium and a valuable resource for seed technologists, conditioners, company managers, educators and related research institutions.

Users can subscribe or renew their subscriptions online. Laboratories that are working with the two Photo Books issued by STEP can update their books by downloading new species from SEED IMAGES and print out the photos they desire. There are 5 different subscription options available: The most cost effective is the 24 month subscription for $200. The 12 month rate is $100. There are 3 trial subscription options: 3 days for $10, 3 months for $35, and 6 months for $65. To renew a subscription or initially subscribe visit the SEED IMAGES website at www.seedimages.com and click on Subscribe Now.

For further information contact Karen Allison at Karen.Allison@colostate.edu, phone # (970)-491-6295.
 

Website: http://www.colostate.edu

Published: February 16, 2010