I would like to download a simple list of plant Species and their GBIF Index Nos, so that I can link out to URLs for all the medicinal plant species I have in my database, using the form:
https://www.gbif.org/species/XXXXXXX
where XXXXXXX is the GBIF index no.
I have found a massive backbone taxonomy file, but it’s so large, Excel can’t open all of it. I only have about, 9,000 species probably, to find.
Hi Michael,
What you’re looking for is the species key. Rather than downloading all 6 million names in the backbone taxonomy, I recommend using the species API. For example, if you want to know the species key for Pistia stratiotes, you would call:
https://api.gbif.org/v1/species/suggest?q=Pistia%20stratiotes
This query does simple matching for the scientific name specified. If you want to make sure that only species returned, you can add rank=species. In the JSON response, the species key is returned right at the beginning, e.g.,
[
{
"key": 2870583,
For 9,000 names, you probably wouldn’t want to do this one by one. There are plenty of tools around to help you, and I believe even Excel (on Windows at least) can read JSON from REST APIs. I’m not able to test this myself, but a few Google searches should help you.
If all else fails, you could share your list of species and someone—myself or the kind folks behind helpdesk@gbif.org—will gladly help.
Best,
Daniel
Jubbly. Thanks very much!
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