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Vascular plant specimens number over 600,000 samples of vegetative parts, cones, fruit, and seeds. The representation of Minnesota's flora is unparalleled, with over 160,000 specimens collected throughout Minnesota's history by Etlar Nielson, Olga Lakela, John W. Moore, Welby Smith, and many others. The assemblage of historic flora of the Upper Midwest (including the Dakotas, Wisconsin, and southwestern Ontario) is among the best in the U.S. There is an excellent collection of circumboreal and arctic flora due to past research interests of E. C. Abbe, W. S. Cooper, D. Lawrence, and their students. Additionally there is an excellent collection of historic Pacific Island flora, through the efforts of J. Tilden, A. A. Heller, and J. W. Moore, and a collection of early Amazonian flora by H. H. Rusby and R. Squires as part of the early exploration (1895-1896) of the Orinoco River delta by the Orinoco Company Ltd. (of Minnesota). J. W. Congdon's collection (over 9,000 specimens) of early California plants (including Yosemite National Park) and approximately 7,000 species of early western U.S. and tropical Asia flora acquired through J. H. Sandberg's exchanges are other significant collections. Today numerous specimens have been acquired from the MN Dept. of Natural Resource's County Biological Survey and from the tropical research conducted by George Weiblen and his assistants in Papua New Guinea.