Guide to Sources for Agricultural and Biological Research [Reprint 2019 ed.] 9780520328730

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CONTRIBUTORS J. Richard Blanchard Catherine Blizzard Elizabeth Boardman C. Robin Burt Lois Farrell Charles Gilreath Esther Johnson Scott Kennedy Jane Kimball Ming-yu Li Marjan Merala Phyllis Reich CONSULTANTS Wallace Olsen Richard Farley Bernard Kreissman

Guide to Sources for Agricultural and Biological Research EDITED

BY

J. R I C H A R D B L A N C H A R D A N D L O I S

FARRELL

Sponsored by the United States National Agricultural Library, United States Department of Agriculture, Beltsville, Maryland

U N I V E R S I T Y OF C A L I F O R N I A P R E S S Berkeley • Los Angeles • London

The University of California Press gratefully acknowledges the assistance of the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in the publication of this volume.

University of California Press Berkeley and Los Angeles, California University of California Press, Ltd. London, England ® 1981 by The Regents of the University of California Printed in the United States of America

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Main entry under title:

Guide to sources for agricultural and biological research.

Includes indexes. 1. Agriculture—Bibliography. 2. Biology—Bibliography. 3. Agricultural research—Bibliography. 4. Biological research—Bibliography. I. Blanchard, J. Richard. II. Farrell, Lois. III. National Agricultural Library (U.S.) Z5071.G83 [S493] 016.63 76-7753 ISBN 0-520-03226-8 AACR2

Contents

Preface ix Introduction / J. Richard Blanchard Chapter A.

1

Agriculture and Biology: General / J. Richard Blanchard General Bibliographical Sources 19 Abstracts and Indexes, General Bibliographies 22 Library Catalogs 45 Government Publications 47 Review Literature 49 Book Reviews SO Congresses and Conferences 50 Dissertations 51 Research in Progress 52 Translations 54 Dictionaries, Encyclopedias, Thesauri, and Lists of Terms Abbreviations 61 Directories 61 Lists of Periodicals 69 Handbooks and Yearbooks 73 Works on Experimental Procedures 74 Classification Systems 76

Chapter B.

17

55

Plant Sciences / Elizabeth Boardman with Sections by Phyllis Reich and Esther Johnson Introduction

79

83

Botany / Elizabeth Boardman

84

Economic Botany and Plant Culture / Elizabeth Boardman 119 Genetics, Cytology, and Plant Breeding / Elizabeth Boardman 166 Plant Pathology / Phyllis Reich and Elizabeth Boardman 176 Forestry and Forest Products / Esther Johnson 192

CONTENTS

Chapter C.

Crop Protection—Pesticides and Pest Control / Ming-yu Li Introduction

232

Abstracts and Indexes Bibliographies Reviews

232

234

237

Dictionaries, Catalogs, and Standards

238

Manuals, Handbooks, and Directories

239

Reference Texts

242

Economics and Statistics Laws and Regulations

277 279

Animal Sciences / Marjan Merala with Sections by Jane Kimball and J. Richard Blanchard 283 Introduction 287 Veterinary Medicine / Marjan Merala Animal Husbandry / Marjan Merala Poultry Husbandry / Marjan Merala

Chapter E.

287 307 322

Wildlife and Wildlife Management / Marjan Merala 328 Commercial Fishing and Fisheries / J. Richard Blanchard Entomology and Nematology / Jane Kimball 347

339

Physical Sciences / Scott Kennedy and C. Robin Burt

379

Introduction

381

Literature Guides

381

Agricultural Chemistry Soils and Fertilizers

382 390

Water Resources and Management

399

Irrigation, Drainage, and Land Reclamation Agricultural Engineering Meteorology Patents

407

413

Remote Sensing and Aerial Surveying

Chapter F.

229

231

Literature Guides

Chapter D.

vi

421

426

433

Food Science and Nutrition / Phyllis Reich Introduction

439

441

Literature Guides and Bibliographies of Bibliographies Abstracts and Indexes 444 Bibliographies 447 Reviews 454 Dictionaries and Encyclopedias 455 Directories 458 Handbooks, Manuals, Texts 462 Food Tables 472 Dietary Requirements 474

442

vii

CONTENTS

Legislation, Regulations, Standards Food Inspection Patents

479

480

Statistics Chapter G.

477

480

Environmental Sciences / Lois Farrell Introduction

485

General Environmental Sources Specific Environmental Topics Ecology

483

489 515

515

Air Pollution

522

Water Pollution

528

Solid Wastes, Agricultural Wastes, and Soil Contamination Environmental Education Environmental Legislation Chapter H.

537

543 546

Social Sciences / Catherine Blizzard

553

Agricultural Economics 556 Agricultural Geography 580 Agricultural History 582 Agricultural Biography 587 Agricultural Legislation 589 Land Reform 592 Agricultural Development 595 Rural Sociology 599 Agricultural Education 604 Chapter I.

Computerized Data Bases for Bibliographic Research / Charles Gilreath Introduction

611

Published References

613

General Purpose and Plant and Animal Sciences Data Bases Physical Sciences and Technology Data Bases Food Science and Nutrition Data Bases Environmental Sciences Data Bases Social Sciences Data Bases Appendix.

618

620 620

621

Acronyms and Abbreviations / Catherine Blizzard Author Index Subject Index Title Index

637 667 687

623

615

Preface

The purpose of this work is to describe and evaluate important sources of information for the fields of agriculture and biology with the major emphasis on agriculture and related subjects. Although it is, in effect, an enlarged and updated version of Literature of agricultural research (University of California Press, 1958) by J. R. Blanchard and Harald Ostvold, because of the great increase in reference sources since 1958 and the recent development of computerized data bases with the resulting changes in literature searching techniques, a complete revision of the older work has been necessary and new chapters or sections have been added. The phrase "agricultural and biological research" as employed in the title includes almost all research activities concerned with the production of food plus a few related topics only indirectly connected with food production, such as wildlife management. The chapter on the environmental sciences, while including general sources, emphasizes the agricultural implications of pollution control and maintenance of the environment. Certain topics sometimes associated with the curricula of agricultural colleges are omitted: these are the various subject areas within home economics such as clothing, decorative arts, family living and home planning that depend on the extensive literature of such widely separated subjects as sociology, fine arts, and psychology. It is expected that this work will be most useful to librarians, graduate students, and research scientists. The types of sources described are primarily library "reference" sources (reviews, abstracts, indexes, bibliographies) which lead to the primary literature, provide information about research in progress, organizations, and researchers

in special fields (directories), or serve as data compilations (handbooks, compendia). Dictionaries and encyclopedias are grouped as sources of information on terms and special topics. Where general encyclopedic works seem to be lacking, some of the outstanding textbooks have been cited as useful sources for background information, particularly if they contain extensive bibliographies. Guides and bibliographies that do include more extensive coverage of texts and specialized monographs are described among the reference works on specific topics. The references have been arranged by broad subject, the following headings having been selected as most likely to bring together related references: agriculture and biology in general, plant sciences, crop protection, animal sciences, physical sciences, food sciences and nutrition, environmental sciences, social sciences, and computerized data bases for bibliographic research. Those references of value to more than one field are described fully in the most appropriate chapter with cross references to the main entries in chapters where they are of secondary importance. Within the various subject subdivisions reference works have been arranged, with some variation, within the following categories: literature guides, bibliographies of bibliographies, and general sources; abstracting and indexing journals and bibliographies; dictionaries and encyclopedias; directories; handbooks and yearbooks; and periodical lists. In some chapters, material has also been listed in special categories such as: library catalogs, government publications, review literature, research in progress, translations, congresses and proceedings, dissertations, classification systems, statistics, geography and atlases, history, biography, and ix

PREFACE

laws and regulations. Annotations have usually been provided unless the title fully explains the nature of the work. Works published before about 1958 generally have not been included unless they are still particularly important for retrospective searching. For this reason, the Literature of agricultural research (A001) may be useful on occasions when descriptions of older or superseded materials are needed. The cut-off point for additions to the manuscript was originally December 1978. However, during the revision process numerous items published in 1979 and some important works announced for publication in 1980 were added although they were not always available for examination. It is hoped that significant missing items and those published after 1979 or 1980 will eventually be included in a supplement or a revised edition. In compiling the present work, the contributors checked various general bibliographical sources and the reference collections of numerous research libraries including the U.S. National Agricultural Library, the Library of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food in London, the Food and Agricultural Organization Library in Rome, and libraries of the University of California, the University of Minnesota, and Texas A and M University. An effort was made to review carefully all the works listed. However, a few items of potential importance are noted which were not examined because they were still in the publication process or were not available for examination for other reasons. In general, selection has been limited to the more valuable current reference tools, with the intention that these will guide the reader to further sources of information. Emphasis has been placed on English-language publications, although an attempt has been made to list works of importance in other languages. It has not been possible to list all specialized bibliographies, statistical sources and directories because their number is overwhelming and their use is often limited. However, the literature guides and bibliographies of bibliographies listed usually will direct one to additional sources of this type. In any case, with computerized literature searching increasingly available, both the production and use of special bibliographies and directories is changing. More specific explanations of the selection policy will be found in the introductions to the various chapters and sections. Although we regret unavoidable and unintentional omissions or errors, it is generally recognized, fortunately, that a compilation of this type cannot be complete or error-free. As the text has been placed in machine-readable form to facilitate the preparation of later editions, suggestions and corrections which can be incorporated in a future version of the work will be gladly received.

x

The editors are particularly grateful to our able collaborators who have prepared various chapters and sections of the book. They have all had years of experience in serving the literature needs of science and their expertise is greatly appreciated. We are also grateful to our consultants, Dr. Richard Farley and Wallace Olsen, Director and Deputy Director of the U.S. National Agricultural Library, and Dr. Bernard Kreissman, University Librarian, University of California, Davis, who have cheerfully provided funds, working space, advice, and moral support. Particular thanks are due to Mr. Frank Hirst and Mr. E. A. R. Bush, Librarian and Deputy Librarian of the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, London, for their valued assistance in obtaining information about British sources. We also express our gratitude to Mr. Thomas Cawley, Librarian of the Rothamstead Experiment Station, Harpenden, England; Mr. J. A. Wright, Librarian of the Tropical Products Institute Library, London; Mr. A. Rutgers, G. de Bruyn and Mr. G. G. van Wijk of PUDOC and the State Agricultural University, Wageningen, The Netherlands; Dr. W. Gocke and Dr. Mitrasingh, Agricultural Library, University of Bonn, West Germany; Dr. E. Müller, Zentrallstelle für Agrardokumentation und -information, Bad Godesberg, West Germany; Mme Marie Louise Cagnac, Centre National de la Recherche Agronomique, Versailles, France; Mrs. C. Schneider, Assistant Librarian, FAO Library, Rome; Mrs. Lida L. Allen, Agris Coordinating Center, FAO, Rome; Professor T. Sawamoto, President of the Japan Association of Agricultural Librarians and Documentalists, Tokyo; Miss Remedios V. Viloria, Agricultural Information Bank for Asia, the Philippines; Dr. S. M. Lawani, The International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, Ibadan, Nigeria; Mr. T. C. Jain, International Crop Research Institute for the Semi-arid Tropics, Hyderabad, India; Mrs. Ana Maria Paz de Erickson, Executive Secretary of the Asociación Interamericana de Bibliotecarios y Documentalistas Agrícolas; and María José Galrao, Library of the Centro Interamericano de Documentación e Información Agrícola, Turrialba, Costa Rica. Advice and information have also been received from Mrs. Jeanne M. Holmes, Deputy Director of the U.S. National Agricultural Library; Mr. Hans Rocke, Head of the Automated Information Retrieval Services, University of California Library, Davis; Miss Patricia Paylore, Arid Lands Information Service, University of Arizona; and Mr. Sean Cooney, The Agricultural Institute, Dublin, Ireland. Mr. Fred Hearth of the California State University, San Francisco, had to withdraw at an early date as a co-editor. However, his help in planning the work was most helpful and much appreciated. Leila Moran, Dr. Alan Fusonie,

xi

PREFACE

and various members of the Reference Department staff of the National Agricultural Library kindly reviewed Chapter A and other chapters and made welcome suggestions. Of the many helpful experts who reviewed the subject chapters the following from the University of California deserve particular thanks for their most useful advice: Dr. Charles M. Rick, Department of Vegetable Crops, Davis; Dr. Grady L. Webster, Botany Department, Davis; Mrs. Erna Thompson, Plant Pathology Department, Davis; Dr. Andrew Leiser, Department of Environmental Horticulture, Davis; Dr. R. Grogan, Plant Pathology Department, Davis; Mr. Peter Evans, Forest Products Library, Berkeley; Dr. Harold Cole, Animal Sciences Department, Davis; Dr. Murray Fowler, School of Veterinary Medicine, Davis; Dr. Daniel E. Peterson, Avian Sciences Department, Davis; Dr. Norman E. Gary and Dr. W. Harry Lange, Jr., Department of Entomology, Davis; Gerald J. Giefer, Water Resources Archives, Berkeley; Mrs. Mary Farrens, Agricultural Economics Library, Davis; Mrs. Silvia Gonzalez, Law Library, Davis; Dr. James Shideler, Agricultural History Center, Davis. The several members of the scientific staffs of the Science and Education Administration of the U.S. Department of Agriculture who reviewed portions of the text include: Doctors Harry R. Cams, H. Marc Cathey, N. Jerry Chatterton, James A. Duke, Miklos Faust, Richard H. Foote, Robyn Frank, D. L Klingman, Jack P. Meiners, John Moseman, J. B. Powell, John A. Romberger, Gideon Schaeffer, Warren C. Shaw, Charles L. Sloger, and Ramon E. Webb. Those from other agencies and institutions who were most helpful include: Dr. Vince Aitro, Pacific Southwest Forest and Range Experiment Station, U.S. Forest Service; Mrs. Ruth F. Schallert, Botany Branch, Smithsonian Institution Libraries; Jayne MacLean and Theodore R. Dudley of the U.S. National Arboretum; Dr. J. F. Loneragan, Murdock University, Murdock, Western Australia; D. E. Gray, Library, Central Veterinary Laboratory, New Haw, Weybridge, Surrey, England; Signe Larson, U.S. Department of the Interior Library; Ida Lewis, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration; Barbara Pedrini and Jean Circiello of the Environmental Protection Agency; Edward T. Green, The National Referral Center, The Library of Congress; Albert Strickland, Hume Library, University of Florida, Gainesville; Barbara Gordon, Forest Resources Library, University of Washington; and Mrs. C. Boyle, Departmental Library, Fisheries and Environment Canada. Needless to say, none of these helpful people is responsible for any mistakes or omissions that may have occurred in this work.

We also wish to thank Nancy Noennig for her careful attention to the copy editing. J. Richard Blanchard, University of California, Davis Lois Farrell, University of California, Berkeley

OUTLINE

OF

J. R I C H A R D

I N T R O D U C T I O N

B L A N C H A R D

I. Definition of Agriculture and Related Fields 3 II. Methods of Transmitting Agricultural and Biological Information 3 A. Research or Scientific Level 5 B. Extension Service Level 5 C. The Trade Level 5 III. Depositories of Information—Libraries and Documentation Centers 5 IV. Information Networks for Agriculture and Biology 9 A. General Background 9 B. International Networks Serving Agriculture and Biology 10 C. Regional Networks 11 D. National Networks 12 1. The U.S. National Agricultural Library 12 2. The National Library of Medicine 13 3. Other types of networks in the United States 13 4. Additional examples of national

networks 13 V. Methods of Literature Searching and Obtaining Information from Literature 13 A. The Current Approach 13 B. The Everyday Approach 14 C. The Exhaustive Approach 14 1. Develop a search strategy 14 2. Check pertinent guides to the literature 15 3. Check library card catalogs 15 4. Obtain advice about useful sources from colleagues and librarians 15 5. Check personal card index and reprint files 15 6. Review what is sometimes called the "organized" literature 15 7. Conduct a search for recent "unorganized" material 15 8. Conduct a retrospective search covering the older literature 16

1

Introduction. J. R I C H A R D

B L A N C H A R D

I. D E F I N I T I O N OF AGRICULTURE AND RELATED FIELDS For centuries before man began to study and record his findings about the natural world around him, agriculture—the production of food—was a practical art or craft practiced by the majority of the world's population. Agriculture has played an important part in the development of most societies, and man's attempts to provide a secure food supply are interwoven with the history of civilization on this planet. When the study of biology or natural history began, it went far beyond descriptions of plants used for food or animals that could furnish food, fur, and other useful products, and so for a time it was of interest to only a few savants and philosophers who rarely sought practical applications for their knowledge. But from the seventeenth century on, many general advances in scientific knowledge were made that eventually served to improve food production. One need only mention the invention of the microscope by Anton Von Leeuwenhoek (1632-1723), the systematic classification of plants by Linnaeus (1707-1778), and contributions by Stephen Hales (1677-1761), who made important studies of transpiration, sap movement, and respiration in plants. In England during the eighteenth century many practical agricultural improvements of both machinery and growing methods were introduced by such pioneers as Jethro Tull (1674-1741) and Arthur Young (1741-1820). The rapid development of biochemistry based on the work of Justus Von Leibig (1803-1873) and the understanding of genetics based on the work of Gregor J. Mendel (1822-1884) and others had a profound influence on the scientific study of agriculture. A more exacting application of science to agri-

cultural problems began in the late nineteenth century with the creation of agricultural experiment stations and the development of curricula for agricultural studies in colleges—the formation of land-grant colleges in the United States, for example. The formal separation between the study of " p u r e " sciences such as botany and chemistry and the applied agricultural sciences has continued in many academic institutions, but the boundaries are now very blurred. Most researchers in agricultural colleges receive their basic training in sciences such as chemistry, physiology, entomology, and botany, and later apply their knowledge to agricultural problems, not infrequently through basic research. In turn, their colleagues in the " p u r e " science departments are often involved in research which has practical applications for agriculture. In addition, social scientists in such fields as economics and sociology do research on rural populations and agricultural machinery and water use. So the lines between biology and agriculture—between the pure and applied sciences—are no longer distinct. It is therefore necessary, when discussing information sources for agriculture, to include the literature and automated data bases for biology and science and technology in general as well as those limited to applied agricultural research. Indeed, in a broad definition of "agriculture," one should now include any activity directly or indirectly involved with the production and distribution of food for the use of mankind. II. M E T H O D S O F T R A N S M I T T I N G AGRICULTURAL AND BIOLOGICAL INFORMATION Much recent and pertinent literature on transmit3

INTRODUCTION

ting scientiñc information is digested and reviewed in such publications as the Annual review of information science and technology and Advances in librarianship. A good bibliographic survey of the subject is Jacqueline Hill's A review of the literature on primary communications in science and technology (London: Aslib occasional paper no. 9, 1972). Many observers agree that at the present time the three basic methods of transmitting information are: oral or informal (conversations with colleagues, attending meetings), visual or audiovisual (films, slides, tape cassettes, videotapes) and documentary (printed literature). Some believe that the oral or informal method is used more frequently than any other and is very effective as it "provides judgment and suggestions of more feasible approaches to the problem being considered." 1 Such information, received through conversations at meetings or via the telephone or personal letters, is obtained from an "invisible college" of colleagues and a " h u m a n network" of scientists in the same field. The network is dominated by "technological gatekeepers"—leaders in research who participate actively in scientific congresses and who communicate regularly with other scientists. 2 Some information is also received through film, slides, tape cassettes, or television. These audiovisual techniques are effective as aids in presenting material to undergraduates and the lay public, and in helping elucidate certain concepts, but at present they do not represent a major method of transferring information among scientists. In spite of the importance of oral communication, one must assume that much information still is primarily transferred through printed documentary sources—journals, books, reports—and that oral communications are based essentially on information obtained originally from printed material. But this concept is not universally accepted. John Maddox, for instance, states that " t h e literature is a pallid reflection of what goes on in the laboratory," and that many scientists have almost dispensed with it, depending instead on colleagues and competitors to inform them of new developments. 3 All who are interested in scientific information realize that Maddox's observations, although a bit overdrawn, are partly true and that some scientists and technologists, particularly those working in applied fields, do not make frequent use of the literature. On the other hand, investigators notice that many scientists at the

4

forefront of their work—the innovators and the gatekeepers—do use literature extensively. They also notice the enormous increase in published literature in recent decades, and the parallel increases in the use of scientific library collections—all attesting to the continuing importance of print in conveying information. Innumerable estimates have been made of the size of the scientific literature, which has grown at an exponential rate in recent years. The number of scientific journals, for instance, increased from 2 in the seventeenth century to between 30,000 and 100,000 (depending on who is making the calculation) at the present time. 4 A survey by the National Academy of Sciences states that "already the figures have become staggering—roughly 40,000 research papers a year in physics, several times that number in chemistry, biology and agriculture, even more in medicine and perhaps as many as 2,000,000 in all fields of science and technology taken together." 5 More exact estimates of the amount of current literature considered important for biology and agriculture can be deduced from the volume of material processed annually by three of the principal automated data bases for these fields. AGRICOLA (1019), prepared by the U. S. National Agricultural Library, covers about 6,500 journals and adds approximately 125,000 items a year; BIOSIS, Previews (1022), made available by the Biosciences Information Service of Biological Abstracts, covers 8,000 journals and includes about 262,000 items a year; the automated data banks of the Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux (CAB) (1023) index materials from 8,500 journals with 130,000 items a year. The amount of overlap between the services is significant, but one could assume from the figures given above that there are roughly 200,000 items published each year of some importance for biology and agriculture. Naturally, the scientific specialist makes no attempt to cover this massive output on a regular basis and may confine himself to a dozen or so journals for routine current reading or scanning. It is also well known that the major portion of the significant literature in certain fields of science is published in only a few journals. For instance, a study published in 1949 showed that 50 percent of the research literature of importance produced in chemistry was published in five journals. 6 Literature having a direct bearing on agricultural problems seems to

Science,

4 Anderla, Georges. 1973. Information in ¡985. a forecasting study of ¡formation needs and resources. Paris: Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), p. 14.

2 Cooney, S. and Allen, T. J. 1974. " T h e technological gatekeeper and policies Tor national and international transfer of information." R A D management, 5:29-33.

5 U.S. National Academy of Sciences. 1969. Scientific and technical communications, p. 9.

1 Abelson, Philip. H. 1968. "Custodians of knowledge." 159:585.

3 Maddox, John. 1967. " I s the literature dead or alive?" 214:1077-1079.

Nature,

6 Fussier, Herman H. 1949. "Characteristics of the research literature used by chemists and physicians in the United States." Library Quarterly, 19:19-35, 119-143.

5

INTRODUCTION

be more widely dispersed in many sources than that of the " p u r e " sciences, partly because it is more interdisciplinary in nature, is sometimes issued in the numerous bulletin series of experiment stations and governments, and is often published in general journals not confined to a specific scientific discipline. But in any case, although the total amount of literature is large, the most frequently used portion of it appears in relatively few serials. For example, there are only 49 titles listed in a study of the most frequently cited serials for agronomy made in 1942-1944, and only seven of these were cited more than eight times in the sample of literature analyzed. 7 A recent citation study by Eugene Garfield of 347 agricultural core journals revealed that some 1,650 journals were noted in the 40,000 literature references. Of these, 75 journals accounted for 56.8 percent of the 40,000 cited references. Commenting on the results of the study, Garfield states that, " i n short, agricultural scientists use and cite the same hard core of frequently cited basic research journals used by all other research workers in the life sciences. Their purpose, the slant of their interest, their mission, if you will, may differ, but the materials are the same. Indeed, the appellation 'agriculture' describes only the mission, rather than any approach to the problem with which agricultural scientists deal." 8 In this respect one should note that for agriculture at least there are roughly three levels of published literature or information flow tailored for different needs. 9 A. Research or Scientific Level This material includes scholarly studies by scientists reporting on original research and is meant to be read by other scientists. It appears mainly in general or specialized journals such as Science, Soil science, and Plant and soil. It also appears in the research bulletins issued by experiment stations, in proceedings of scientific congresses, and in reports of governments and industrial concerns. It probably forms 90 percent or more of the material of agricultural interest indexed in Biological abstracts (A043), the Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux indexing services, and in Chemical abstracts (E012). The percentage is somewhat smaller in the Bibliography of agriculture (A041), which also includes selected items from extension 7 Brown, Charles H. 1956. "Scientific serials." ACRL monograph no. 16. Chicago: Association or College and Reference Libraries, pp. 185-186. 8 Garfield, Eugene. 1975. "Journal citation studies. 20. Agricultural journals and the agricultural literature." Current contents. Agriculture, biology and environmental sciences, no. 20:5-11. 9 Maltha, D. J. 1972. "Information needs in agriculture." International Association of Agricultural Librarians and Documentalists, Quarterly Bulletin, 17:170-177.

and trade publications. It forms, in essence, the core literature of scientific agriculture and biology.

B. Extension Service Level This literature is intended to explain improved methods of agriculture, based on scientific research, to farmers and the general public. It is usually written by persons with scientific training working in extension agencies which, in the United States, are associated with state universities and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. In some other countries it may be handled entirely by national or provincial ministries or departments of agriculture. No single indexing source attempts to cover all this large body of literature, as much of it is mimeographed and ephemeral in nature. However, selected items from the U.S. Cooperative Extension Service literature are indexed by the Bibliography of agriculture (A041). Agrindex (A037) may also include some extension-type materials from certain countries. Much information is also passed on orally by extension service agents to farmers and the public. C. The Trade Level This level includes farm, industrial, and trade journals. Farm journals such as Successful fuming and Farm journal are popular in nature, include information on new products and services, and have articles on farm problems, often advisory in nature, which will appeal to the rural public. The articles are, in fact, often based on extension service publications. Some serve special groups such as those involved in cattle or swine production. Industrial journals are concerned with certain agricultural industries such as Feed industry and Farm chemicals. They may at times include articles that are more scholarly and scientific than those in the general farm journals. The Bibliography of agriculture (A041) often indexes material of this type on a selective basis.

III. DEPOSITORIES OF I N F O R M A T I O N L I B R A R I E S AND DOCUMENTATION CENTERS Scientists often maintain small reference collections of printed material—books, journals, reprints and reports—in their offices or departmental quarters. But the major portion of the literature in their field will usually be available in the library or documentation center of their university, ministry, institute, or experiment station. The library collection will usually be indexed by subject, author, and title and arranged according to a classification schedule.

INTRODUCTION

Some libraries and documentation centers provide their own abstracting or indexing service in printed form. Often they will assist with manual literature searches, and many now have units which will search the computerized data bases for pertinent literature references. Photocopying services are almost always available, and some libraries will even provide tailor-made translations. In other words, the modern library or documentation center is no longer just a storage unit but is an active service organization. No recent and reliable estimate exists of the number of libraries and documentation centers serving all the agricultural and biological sciences. According to D. H. Boalch's World directory of agricultural libraries and documentants (A342) there were 2,531 agricultural libraries in 1959 and this number has probably increased considerably since then. The work of these libraries has been greatly assisted by the International Association of Agricultural Librarians and Documentalists, founded in 1955 in Belgium, which, through conferences and its Quarterly bulletin (A027) and other publications, has been able to coordinate and encourage bibliographic work in the field of agriculture. The majority of agricultural libraries can be divided into three large categories: those associated with governmental agencies such as ministries of agriculture; those serving agricultural colleges and experiment stations affiliated with them; and document centers or special libraries designed to support the research work of industrial firms or privately supported research agencies. In addition, there are a few libraries serving international organizations and a growing number of international documentation centers for specific crops or kinds of agriculture. Formerly the collections of many of these libraries consisted largely of bulletins and trade publications for applied agriculture plus specialized scientific publications for such fields as genetics, nutrition, veterinary medicine, and entomology. At present, with more emphasis being given by agricultural scientists to basic research, the typical agricultural library will also have extensive collections in the natural sciences related to agriculture, such as chemistry, botany, and zoology. Material in economics and sociology will be available for agricultural economists and rural sociologists; publications dealing with environmental protection, environmental laws and regulations, and pollution control will also be available for the many researchers now working in these fields. An important international agricultural library is the Library of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) in Rome, which was founded in 1909 as a library for the International Institute of Agriculture. This library,

6

with a collection of approximately 500,000 volumes, has produced several bibliographical tools of importance, including its Catalogue systématique (A165). Classified according to the Universal Decimal Classification (UDC) system, the collection is international in scope and concerns all fields of agriculture and related disciplines. The Library was reorganized according to American principles with the help of the Rockefeller Foundation from 1925 to 1929. Although it is primarily for use by the staff of the FAO, it is open to all qualified investigators. The Library of the Instituto Interamericano de Ciencias Agrícolas in Turrialba, Costa Rica, is also of international importance. It has produced several bibliographical publications of wide interest for Latin America and houses the secretariat of the Interamerican Association of Agricultural Librarians (AIBDA). Its collection is particularly rich in material on coffee and cocoa and other crops of importance in Latin America. Although it is of a specialized nature, the excellent Library of the International Rice Research Institute in Los Baños, the Philippines, should be mentioned. Other specialized international libraries include those of the Royal Tropical Institute (RTI), Amsterdam; the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) in Ibadan, Nigeria; the Centro Internacional de Agricultura Tropical (CIAT) in Cali, Colombia; the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-arid Tropics (ICRISAT) in Hyderabad, India; and the Tropical Products Institute (TPI) in London. In the United States, agricultural librarians and documentalists coordinated their work before World War II through the now defunct Agricultural Libraries Section of the American Libraries Association. They now work through the Science and Technology Section of the American Association of College and Research Libraries of the ALA and through sections of the Special Libraries Association. One of the largest agricultural libraries in the world is the Library of the U.S. Department of Agriculture in Beltsville, Maryland, which was officially designated the National Agricultural Library in 1962. In 1978 the Library became a part of the Technical Information Systems of the Science and Education Administration of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Technical Information Systems is supervised by the Library's Director and includes related activities such as the Current Research Information System (CRIS) and the Extension Management Information System (EMIS). The Library was started in 1862 and is based on a collection dating back to 1839 which was originally in the Agricultural Division of the Patent Office. Its collection now numbers well over 1,700,000 volumes and is particularly strong in chemistry, botany, zoology, and other sciences related to

7

INTRODUCTION

agriculture. It also has extensive ñles of agricultural trade publications, government agricultural publications, stock, herd, and stud books, and apicultura! publications. Although principally designed as a service agency for the various units of the Department of Agriculture, it is also a national library, as its name indicates. Its services are extended through the Bibliography of agriculture (A041), other bibliographical publications, the automated data base service called AGRICOLA (formerly CAIN), and a network of associated land-grant university libraries. The monthly Bibliography of agriculture has been for some years one of the most comprehensive indexing services for agriculture and covers a major portion of the significant agricultural literature published throughout the world. The Dictionary catalog of the National Agricultural Library, 1862-1965 (A170) indexes more than 1,000,000 items by author, subject, and title. Its supplement, the National Agricultural Library catalog (A171), began publication on a monthly basis in 1966. Many of the early agricultural libraries in the United States were connected with agricultural societies. In the nineteenth century, schools for the study of agriculture were established which were an outgrowth of these societies. The development of agricultural colleges was greatly expedited with the passing of the Federal Land Grant Act (the Morrill Act) in 1862. The majority of agricultural libraries that exist at present in the United States are associated with these "landgrant" colleges and universities, which are now, in most cases, general, state-supported institutions providing education in the basic arts and sciences and professional subjects as well as agriculture. At some of these universities, the agricultural library is separate from the general university library and primarily serves the college of agriculture and related colleges and the agricultural experiment station. An example is the Albert R. Mann Library at Ithaca, New York, which is a consolidation of various libraries belonging to the New York State Colleges of Agriculture and Home Economics at Cornell University. It also serves, besides these colleges, the agricultural experiment station at Ithaca and basic biological science departments. The Mann Library is probably the largest separate agricultural college library in the United States, having a total of about 460,000 volumes in 1977. It uses the Library of Congress classification system and has strong special collections concerning beekeeping, poultry, and entomology. Another arrangement is seen at the University of California, Davis, where library service for the College of Agriculture and the agricultural experiment station is provided from the general university library, which had a collection of 1,300,000 volumes in 1977, of which

about 30-35 percent pertained to the biological sciences and agriculture. Several departments of the College of Agriculture at Davis also maintain small reference collections ranging in size from 500 to 3,000 volumes. The Davis library pattern resembles the one at the Iowa State University of Science and Technology at Ames, Iowa, which has one of the largest and best-selected collections pertaining to agriculture and related subjects among the land-grant institutions. At Purdue University, Lafayette, Indiana, there is the Life Science Library, formed in 1958 as the result of consolidation of the Biology Library, the Agricultural Experiment Station Library, and some departmental libraries, although several departmental libraries with working collections of 300 to 5,300 volumes still exist. This arrangement illustrates the overlap and close relationship between basic biological and agricultural literature. Finally, in a few states there are agricultural experiment stations with their own libraries which are not physically placed with the state land-grant university. An example is the Ohio Agricultural Experiment Station Library at Wooster, Ohio. There are also many libraries and documentation centers in the United States serving industrial concerns, societies, institutes, and laboratories which have valuable special collections and provide intensive service for their clientele. Examples of these include the American Meat Institute Foundation Library in Chicago; the John Deere Company Library in Moline, Illinois; the Research Information Systems Center Library of the General Foods Corporation in White Plains, New York; the Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research, Inc. Library in Yonkers, New York; and the Horticultural Society of New York Library in New York City. Canada's principal repository for agricultural literature is the Canada Department of Agriculture Library in Ottawa, founded in 1910. It has about 800,000 volumes and several branch libraries in various parts of Canada. Canada, like the United States, also has a number of agricultural libraries located in colleges and universities. The agricultural library situation in Great Britain and the Commonwealth countries has been much influenced by the work of the Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux. With their remarkably effective combination of research stations and libraries, these bureaus have contributed greatly to improvement in agricultural techniques around the world and have provided many abstracting services and bibliographical publications which are basic to all agricultural library collections. One of the bureaus, which can be used as an example, is the Commonwealth Bureau of Soils located at Harpenden, England. It produces abstracts, which are printed in the bimonthly journal Soils and fer-

INTRODUCTION

tilizers, and maintains a card index on soil-science subjects consisting of several hundred thousand cards. This bibliographic work is based on the excellent library of the Rothamsted Experiment Station, also at Harpenden, which was founded in 1843 and reported 80,000 volumes in 1974. This library uses a modified form of the Universal Decimal System of classification and has strong collections in soils, plant sciences, insecticides, entomology, statistics, and the history of agriculture. Other libraries serving the research needs of the Commonwealth bureaus include the Joint Library of the Commonwealth Forestry Bureau and the University of Oxford Department of Forestry in Oxford, the Commonwealth Institute of Entomology Library in London, and the Joint Library of the Commonwealth Bureau of Dairy Science and the National Institute for Research in Dairying at Shinfield, Reading. The largest agricultural library in Britain is the Main Library of the Ministry of Agriculture in London, which has about 200,000 volumes. It issues various bibliographic publications and maintains branch libraries. Important society libraries include the Lindley Library of the Royal Horticultural Society in London and the Linnean Society of London Library, which contain particularly strong collections on natural history. One of the most important biological sciences libraries in the world is the Library of the British Museum (Natural History), which has over 400,000 volumes. Some important university libraries are the School of Agriculture Library at the University of Cambridge, the Library of the Agriculture Department of the University of Edinburgh, and Oxford University's Department of Agriculture Library. Among the various special libraries are the Tropical Products Institute Library and the International Wool Secretariat Library in London. Important agricultural libraries in Ireland are the Library of the Department of Agriculture, the Agricultural Library of the Royal Dublin Society, and the Library of the Society of Agriculture, University College, Dublin. The majority of agricultural libraries in Europe and Britain use the Universal Decimal System of classification or, in some cases, the von Frauendorfer system (whereas American libraries usually employ the Library of Congress or Dewey systems), and they often place more reliance than do American libraries on classed rather than subjectheading catalogs. Their staffs include personnel who are trained as subject specialists rather than as librarians, although there are many exceptions to the rule. In European universities the agricultural book collections will often be in the libraries of faculties or departments rather than in the central library. Only a few agricultural libraries in Europe, including Russia, can be described here. An espe-

8

cially strong library, noted for its services and collections, is the Landbouwhogeschool Bibliotheek (Agricultural University Library) at Wageningen, the Netherlands. Founded in 1873, the Library has about 400,000 volumes and consists of a central library plus about 40 special or departmental libraries. An important indexing journal, the Landbouwdocumentatie (A074), is based on the Wageningen library's collection. Notable agricultural libraries in Belgium are the Bibliothèque of the Institut Agronomique de l'Etat in Gembloux, the Bibliothèque Centrale of the Ministry of Agriculture in Brussels, and the Rijkslandbouwhogeschool Bibliotheek in Ghent. For France one can list, among others, the Library of the Centre National de Recherches Agronomiques in Versailles, as well as the Bibliothèque of the Académie d'Agriculture de France in Paris, one of the oldest agricultural libraries, founded in 1761. A great many agricultural libraries of all types exist in both East and West Germany. Probably the largest, with over 200,000 volumes, is the Landwirtschaftliche Zentralbibliothek of the Deutsche Akademie der Landwirtschaftswissenschaften zu Berlin, founded in 1951. The staff of an important abstracting service, the Landwirtschaftliches Zentralblatt (A071), uses the resources of this library. The agricultural section of the Universitats Bibliothek at Bonn is worth noting, as it has particularly complete collections of printed German agricultural theses and foreign scientific literature on agriculture and wine growing, and has been designated as the National Agricultural Library of West Germany. In Austria the largest agricultural library is at the Hochschule fiir Bodenkultur, with about 130,000 volumes reported in 1974. All the Scandinavian countries have good agricultural libraries with large collections and experienced staff members. They include the Kgl. Veterinaer-og Landhohojskoles Bibliotek (Royal Veterinary and Agricultural College Library) in Copenhagen; the Norges Landbrukshogskoles Bibliotek (Norwegian Agricultural Library) in Vollebekk, Norway; and the Kungl. Lantbrukshôgskolan och Statens Lantbruksfôrsôks Bibliotek (Library of the Royal Agricultural College and the State Agricultural Research Council) in Uppsala, Sweden. The most notable agricultural library in Russia is the TSentral'naia Nauchnaia Sel'skokhoziaistvennaia Biblioteka (Central Scientific Agricultural Library of Moscow), which reports holdings of over two million items. This library also has a Leningrad branch with about one million items. Its principal publication, Sel'skokhoziaistvennaia Literatura SSR (Agricultural Literature of the USSR) (A089), indexes periodical and other literature and is of much value. Another large

9

INTRODUCTION

agricultural library in Moscow is the Moskovskaia Sel'skokhoziaistvennaia Akademiia im. K. A. Timiriazeva Biblioteka (Timiriazev Agricultural Academy Library). Two additional libraries in the Slavic countries that issue important bibliographic publications and serve as centers for agricultural research are the Centralna Biblioteka Rolnicza (Central Agricultural Library) in Warsaw and the Ustredni Zemedelska a Lesnicka Knihovna (Central Agricultural and Forestry Library) in Prague. Outside of the FAO Library in Rome (already noted), there are few agricultural libraries of importance in the Mediterranean area and the Middle East. The same can be said in general for Africa south of the Sahara, although the new nations are making efforts to institute new agricultural library services or improve existing ones. Three of the most active libraries serving agriculture are the Joint Library of the East African Agriculture and Forestry Research Organization and East African Veterinary Research Organization in Kenya; the University College Library in Ibadan, Nigeria; and the Central Library (and its branches) of the Department of Agriculture in Pretoria, Union of South Africa. In Oceania and the Far East there are scarcely any outstanding agricultural libraries noted for services and publications, although there are several with moderately good collections. Examples include the Joint Library of the Massey Agricultural College and Dairy Research Institute in Palmerston North, New Zealand; the Department of Agriculture of Tasmania Library, in Hobart, Australia; the Indian Agricultural Research Institute Library and the Indian Council of Agricultural Research Library in New Delhi, India. In Japan a special effort has been made to organize a new agricultural library research center in the Tokyo area. Some of the largest research collections for agriculture in Japan at present are the Library of the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, the Faculty of Agriculture Libraries at Hokkaido University, the University of Tokyo, and Kyoto University. Little is known about the present state of Chinese agricultural libraries. One of the most interesting libraries in the Far East is the Bibliotheca Bogoriensis at Bogor, which has a collection of about 200,000 volumes and serves as a central science library of Indonesia. Started by the Dutch, it has especially rich collections in botany, as it was originally the library for the State Botanical Gardens—Bibliotheek van's Lands Plantentuim. In a survey 10 published in 1964, Hernandez de Caldas states that about 173 libraries with total collections of 1,268,496 volumes serve agriculture 10 Hernandez de Caldas, A. 1964. "Existencias bibliográphicas agropecuarias en América Laiina." International Association of Agricultural Librarians and Documentalists, Quarterly bulletin. 9:176-178.

in 20 Latin American countries. Unfortunately, the majority of these libraries are relatively small and poorly supported, although in several countries vigorous efforts are being made to improve services and collections. The work of the Library of the Instituto Interamericano de Ciencias Agrícolas in Turrialba, Costa Rica, has already been mentioned. Some of the larger libraries in Argentina include the Library of the Facultad Agronomía y Veterinaria of the Universidad de Buenos Aires, and the large botanical library of the Instituto de Botánica Darwinion in San Isidro, near Buenos Aires. Important libraries in Brazil include the Library of the Instituto Agronómico de Estado de Sao Paulo in Campinas and the various libraries of the Ministerio da Agricultura in Rio de Janeiro. An especially notable library in Peru serves the Estación Experimental Agrícola de La Molina. The largest agricultural library in Uruguay is at the Facultad de Agronomía of the Universidad de la República in Montevideo. Useful bibliographic publications are issued by the Library of the Facultad de Agronomía of the Universidad Central de Venezuela in Maracay. There are a number of other libraries in South America that have recently been improved and provide modern, well-selected collections and useful services. They include the Library of the Estación Experimental Central in Pergamino, Argentina; the Biblioteca Central of the Ministerio de Agricultura at La Platina near Santiago, Chile; and the Library of the Escuela Nacional de Agricultura in Chapingo, Mexico. From this survey it can be seen that the principal agricultural libraries are concentrated in Europe, Great Britain, Russia, and North America. Of these, several large national and university libraries plus the Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux of Great Britain and their related libraries serve as the world's principal repositories for agricultural knowledge. They also greatly aid agricultural research all over the world through their indexing journals and bibliographical publications, many of which are described in the following chapters. The smaller collections in ministries, institutes, colleges, and experiment stations in all countries are also important, however, and serve as essential information sources for agricultural scientists. IV. INFORMATION NETWORKS FOR AGRICULTURE AND BIOLOGY A. General Background Because of the great increase in information resources for biology and agriculture, no single library or documentation center can provide adequate services and material for all purposes. For

INTRODUCTION

10

this reason library and informational networks that share resources and provide information services have developed rapidly in recent years. One should note, however, that the concept that information should be shared and dispersed through related groups and institutions is an old one. In agriculture, for instance, we have had since the nineteenth century in the United States the remarkably effective land-grant college system, with its network of experiment stations and extension services, all coordinated with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and its widespread system of research stations and bureaus. One should also mention the network of agricultural institutes of worldwide importance developed under the auspices of the Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux in the United Kingdom. Research in the United States and Europe has also greatly benefited since the early part of this century by the sharing of library materials identified and located through large-scale union catalogs of holdings created at the Library of Congress and other large research libraries, and distributed under national and international interlibrary loan networks. The term "network" in a communication sense has been used for years in connection with radio and telephone services. However, telephone and radio networks are essentially communications grids that are independent of the intellectual content or informational purpose of the messages they carry. When a network is limited to a specific functional purpose and there is interdependence for information among the participants, it seems logical to call it an information network. According to Becker and Olsen," networks can be identified in the following three ways: 1. by class of equipment—telephone networks, computer networks, teletype networks. 2. by form of data—audio networks, film networks. 3. by function—educational networks, financial networks (transmission of stock market information), library networks. The recent development of information networks has received a great impetus from the improvement of computer facilities, the creation of large machine-readable data bases, improvements in communications technology, and the efforts of such groups as Unesco, F AO, the European Community, EDUCOM, the National Science Foundation, scientific societies, and library associations. Of particular importance to networks in the United States has been a recent decision by the Federal Communications Commission which

14 Swanson, Rowena. 1975. systems." Op. cit., 10:43-99.

11 Becker, Joseph and Olsen, Wallace. 1968. "Information networks." Annual review of information science and technology, 3:288-327.

15 Adams, Scott and Werdel, Judith A. 1975. "Cooperation and information activities through international organizations." Op. cit., 10:303356.

allows a user to attach any manufacturer's terminals to his telephone, in contrast to the former restriction that he use only equipment supplied by the telephone companies. This decision makes possible the use of newly designed terminals for connecting computers, typewriter keyboards, facsimile machines, and other signal-generating devices to telephone lines. In addition, the FCC has authorized the establishment of special-purpose communications carriers in competition with the telephone companies. 12 Other developments that presage the possibility of great improvements in networks include Cable Television (CATV) and communications satellites. The two-way communication capability of CATV should be of much value for networks and should permit innovative services not previously feasible. It appears, then, that many of the technical problems involving the improvement of network services have been or will be solved, although serious difficulties involving the copyright law, financing, and organization still remain. In any case, numerous information networks are well established, are providing excellent service, and have proved their value. An excellent general review of the development of information networks and services is provided in the Annual review of information science and technology.131S B. International Networks Serving Agriculture and Biology The development of international as well as national scientific information networks has been encouraged by the formation of Unesco's UNISIST (World Science Information System), although many networks were being planned or were in existence before UNISIST was established. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations might be loosely described as an information network. Its Documentation Center, started in 1967, maintains a computerized storage and retrieval system for the very extensive collection of FAO documents, both published and unpublished. One of FAO's most important recent activities has been planning for AGRIS (International Information System for the Agricultural Sciences and Technology). 16 It is planned 12 Olson, Edwin E., Shank, Russell, and Olsen. Harold A. 1972. "Library and information networks." Annual review of information science and technology, 7:298. 13 Aines, Andrew A. and Day, Melvin S. 1975. "National planning of information services." Op. cit.. 10:3-42, 330 "Design and evaluation of information

11

INTRODUCTION

that AGRIS will create a single and rapid current awareness service with worldwide coverage and with FAO acting as a coordinating agency. In addition, F AO would assume some responsibility for coordinating special agricultural indexing and abstracting services so as to achieve concentration in place of the present wasteful duplication. AGRIS's first product, Agrindex (A037), includes references to current agricultural documents supplied by several national and international documentation centers. It represents "level 1" of AGRIS and provides "a mechanism for the speedy collection from all input centers of all the information necessary to maintain a comprehensive bibliography of current literature in all those subject fields that are represented by the activities of FAO and to issue the bibliography both on magnetic tape and in printed form." "Level 2 " of AGRIS is to be "a worldwide network of specialized services, data banks, and data analysis services, to provide specific detailed information responding to the needs of individual users." 17 Another project being undertaken by FAO is called CARIS (Computerized Agricultural Research Information System). The purpose of CARIS is to cover information in specific countries on research institutions and stations and their research activities; it is not primarily a document retrieval system. The first pilot program covers several countries of West Africa plus two international research institutes, the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA). Some observers question the need for these ambitious projects by FAO, particularly the need for Agrindex,, because of their overlap with existing services, but in general they are being supported as potentially valuable efforts in international cooperation. Another recent and promising international experiment in the field of agricultural documentation is called AGLINET (Agricultural Libraries Network). 18 The AGLINET International Center is located in FAO's library in Rome. The four regional centers which have agreed to be initial participants are the National Agricultural Library of the United States, the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food in London, the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA) in Ibadan, Nigeria, and the Centro Internacional de 16 DuBois, G . 1972. " U n Système international d'information pour les sciences et la technologie agricoles ( A G R I S ) . " International Association of Agricultural Librarians and D o c u m e n t a n t s , Quarterly Bulletin, 17:55-64. 17 AGRIS and the developing countries. Recommendations of the FAO/IDRC meeting held in Rome, 26-28 September, 1973. Ottawa, Canada: International Development Research Centre, 1974. 18 " A G L I N E T News— 1." 1974. International Association of Agricultural Librarians and Documentalists, Quarterly Bulletin, 19:116-120.

Agricultura Tropical (CIAT) in Cali, Colombia. AGLINET hopes to provide and promote efficient and effective delivery of agricultural library materials from the haves to the have-nots through a network of regional centers which act as service points and clearinghouses. Cooperating libraries are encouraged to refer requests for literature not in their own collection nor those of neighboring libraries to their AGLINET regional library. If the regional library cannot satisfy the request, it is forwarded to another regional library or to the international center. AGLINET participants agree to take immediate steps to satisfy requests cleared and forwarded by another participant. Photocopies of material are usually provided rather than the original copies. A bibliographic and reference service is also provided. It is hoped that this new network will prove to be a practical vehicle for the dissemination of agricultural information. In discussing international networks one should also mention the services of the Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux (CAB). Although most of its research and abstracting work is done in the United Kingdom, CAB gives particular attention to the needs of the Commonwealth countries in all parts of the globe and considers itself an international rather than a national organization. Certain other services, although almost entirely documentary in nature, are produced through international cooperation. An example is the International Food Information Service (IFIS) which publishes Food science and technology abstracts (F025) from a computerized data base. It has an internationally based editorial board and is sponsored by organizations in about nine countries. The abstracts are edited in Shinfield, England, and are then flown to Frankfurt, West Germany, for computer processing, pubication, and distribution at the Zentralstelle für maschinelle Dokumentation (ZMD). C. Regional Networks Several examples of regional networks serving agriculture and biology can be mentioned. In a report to an IAALD Congress, 19 Dr. Dorothy Parker described the objectives and the efforts of EAAFRO (East African Agricultural and Forestry Research Organization) and EAVRO (East African Veterinary Research Organization), which attempt to meet the research and literature needs of Kenya and other East African countries. Very useful efforts have been made in Latin America to encourage coordinated use of library collections 19 Parker, Dorothy. 1971. "Principles of assistance for a network of agricultural libraries in Africa and Asia." World Congress of Agricultural Librarians and Documentalists, 4th, Paris, 1970. Acquisition and exploitation of information in the field of food and agriculture. Paris: Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique, p. 697-698.

INTRODUCTION

and information services by AIBDA (Associación Interamericana de Bibliotecarios y Documentalistas Agrícolas) and by the Centro Interamericano de Documentación e Información Agrícolas (CIDIA) of the Instituto Interamericano de Ciencias Agrícolas (IICA) in Turrialba and San José, Costa Rica. Their network is called Sistema Interamericano de Información para las Ciencias Agrícolas (AGRINTER). CIDIA's various computer-produced documentation services such as the Indice agricola de América Latina y el Caribe (Al22) are considered a part of the AGRINTER system. An important regional network now in the planning stage under the aegis of the European Community is the European Information Network (EURONET). The purpose of EURONET will be to coordinate the activities of the member states' scientific and technical information and documentation services. A new information network for Southeast Asia is called the Agricultural Information Bank for Asia (AIBA), which is a part of the Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in Agriculture (SEARCA), located in the Philippines. AIBA collects information from Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Bangladesh, South Korea, and the Philippines and sends it to AGRIS for inclusion in Agrindex (A037). It also issues Agriasia (A098), a printed bibliographical publication. D. National Networks Almost all of the major industrial countries have information networks of various types. Two important discipline-related systems in the United States are based on national libraries. 1. The U.S. National Agricultural Library The U.S. National Agricultural Library (NAL), formerly known as the U.S. Department of Agriculture Library and now a segment of the Technical Information Systems of the Science and Education Administration of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, forms the center of an information network composed largely of land-grant university libraries. Formal efforts to establish this network started in 1965 with the publication of Agricultural biological literature exploitation.10 This was followed in 1969 by the publication of a study by EDUCOM which outlined a plan for network development. 21 Legislation approving the development of NAL's Agricultural Sciences Information Network (ASIN) was recently passed by the 20 U.S. National Agricultural Library. 196S. Agricultural biological literature exploitation. Report of Task Force Abel, a system study of NAL and its users. 21 U.S. National Agricultural Library. 1969. Agricultural sciences information network development plan.

12

Congress (Public Law 95-113), and NAL has implemented a number of recommendations in the above-mentioned reports. For instance, three regional networks in the southern and western parts of the country have been developed with the cooperation of land-grant universities. These have been successful and are now providing document delivery services to USDA employees and some other agricultural research workers in the regions involved. In addition, cooperative agreements have been signed with about 20 land-grant libraries in which the libraries agree to maintain complete files of publications of state agricultural experiment stations and extension services. Agreements have also been reached concerning responsibility for collections in certain subject fields, to eliminate unnecessary duplication and costs. For instance, the University of California Library at Davis has agreed to maintain the comprehensive collection for the history of agricultural machinery. Perhaps the most useful service provided by NAL is the worldwide collection and indexing of agricultural literature, exemplified in its wellknown publication, the Bibliography of agriculture (A041), which was started in 1942. Information on AGRICOLA (1019), NAL's machine-readable data base, an important part of its network, is outlined in the chapter on "Computerized data bases for bibliographic research." Reference should also be made to NAL's international activity. The Bibliography of Agriculture receives worldwide use and is distributed under exchange arrangements to almost all other countries. NAL also provides photocopies of material to researchers and libraries in other countries, and it is assisting FAO in the development of the International Information System for the Agricultural Sciences and Technology (AGRIS). In addition, it participates in the new and still rudimentary international Agricultural Libraries Network (AGLINET). Although it is not yet complete, NAL's information network should be of increasing value, as a review of its activities indicates. Several other USDA-related services, some of which are coordinated with NAL, should be noted. For instance, the Cooperative State Research Services Organization, based principally on activities of USDA research agencies and state agricultural experiment stations, has developed a Current Research Information System, CRIS (1025), which is computer-based and provides ready access to current research in the agencies involved. In many cases this involves research for which published results are not yet available. The Extension Service has also developed a comparable system entitled Extension Management Information System (EMIS). Both of these systems are now a part of the USDA's Technical Informa-

13

INTRODUCTION

tion Systems which include the National Agricultural Library. 2. The National Library of Medicine The oldest and most extensive library information network in the United States is based on the National Library of Medicine (NLM) and a cooperating group of 11 regional libraries, the first of which was established in 1967. The network provides reference, bibliographical, and document delivery services to an extensive biomedical clientele throughout this country and abroad. The network's operational model is hierarchical with four levels: the basic unit library (which may be a hospital library), a medical school library, a regional library, and the National Library of Medicine. Each of these levels has specific responsibilities. For instance, the unit library is responsible for direct service to its immediate clientele and solicits material from the local medical school library before going to the regional library. The regional library is responsible for educational programs, handles more difficult reference questions, and has the major resource collection for the region. It is also a key outlet for MEDLARS and MEDLINE (1027) services in its region. The NLM is the keystone of the structure, providing grants, general policy guidance, and computerized bibliographical services (MEDLARS and MEDLINE). Because of its very large collection it is also a major resource for material not available elsewhere. The NLM in Bethesda, Maryland, is supplemented by the Lister Hill National Center for Biomedical Communication, also in Bethesda, and the National Medical Audiovisual Center in Atlanta, Georgia. NLM has been much involved in international activities. For instance, it acquires many foreign publications through exchange arrangements with 895 institutions in 88 countries. In the year 1973 it handled 19,000 requests for interlibrary loans, computer searches, reference searches, and audiovisual loans from 48 developing countries in Latin America, the Far East, the Near East, and Africa. In cooperation with the Panamerican Health Organization (PAHO) it established a regional library of medicine (BIREME) in Sâo Paulo, Brazil. In addition, NLM has eight bilateral agreements which provide for MEDLARS centers in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the World Health Organization. Under these agreements, NLM provides computer tapes, and documentation and training for the foreign centers which have been in successful operation for several years. The NLM network, developed at great cost over a period of about 15 years is, without question, of incalculable value to the biomedical community and is a model of what a successful network can accomplish.

3. Other Types of Networks in the United States Very few other discipline-related networks that link up full-scale indexing of the literature and large machine-readable data bases with a coordinated system of document-delivery agencies (libraries) exist in the United States. There are, however, numerous library networks such as the New England Library Network (NELINET), which provide general rather than disciplinerelated services. Also, there are numerous data base services for specific disciplines. Some of the well-known ones are provided by the old line indexing and abstracting services, such as Chemical abstracts, Biological abstracts, and the Engineering index. SDI and on-line services for these and other data bases are provided to library networks or independent units by commercial suppliers such as the Systems Development Corporation, the Bibliographic Retrieval Service, the Lockheed Corporation, and other such organizations. The rather amazing proliferation of these services indicates that the age of the large machine-readable data base is upon us and that such data bases must form a vital part of any working information network. See Chapter I for more information on this subject. 4. Additional Examples of National Networks One of the world's largest national systems for science and technology in general is the Soviet Union's All-Union Institute of Scientific and Technical Information (VINITI), which publishes Referativnyi zhurnal (A088) and provides traditional information services such as photocopies and translations as well as access to a large computerized data bank store. In France a national network for agricultural documentation, called AGRIDOC, has recently been planned. It is composed of organizations such as the documentation department of the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), which publishes the Bulletin signaletique (A069) and the Centre National de Recherches Agronomiques (CNRA). CNRA is supervising the preparation of a Thesaurus AGRIDOC (A310), an official AGRIDOC project. V. METHODS OF LITERATURE SEARCHING AND OBTAINING INFORMATION FROM LITERATURE According to studies by Melvin Voigt and others it is generally agreed that scientists use three different approaches to obtain information. 22 A. The Current Approach This approach involves keeping up-to-date with 22 Voigt, Melvin. 1961. "Scientists' approaches to information." ACRL monograph no. 24. Chicago: Am. Library Assoc.

INTRODUCTION

developments in one's field. Besides information received orally, from letters, or at meetings, this usually involves the regular reading of current journals, reviews, and monographs. The scientist also may read or check certain sections of current abstracting or indexing journals such as Biological abstracts (A043), the Bibliography of agriculture (A041), Agrindex (A037), or one of the CAB services, and often may obtain preprints or reprints from colleagues. Another increasingly important method is to scan tables of contents from selected journals in one's field. The most widely known service of this type is Current contents (A051), issued in several sections by the Institute for Scientific Information. A "profile" of a scientist's current research interests can also be placed on file with one of the automated data base services, and a computer-produced list of references on the subjects involved will be sent each time new material is added to that data base. Such a procedure, now widely used, is called Selective Dissemination of Information (SDI) or current awareness service. B. The Everyday Approach In the course of conducting a research project in the field or laboratory a scientist will have an immediate need for specific facts such as a particular property of a chemical, the boiling point of a liquid, the description of an organism, identification of a mathematical formula, an equation, a theory, or a statistic. Although the informational need is specific and limited, it is imperative that it be filled specifically and correctly. Fortunately, much of this type of information is readily available in data books, monographs, encyclopedias, or compendia. For instance, a variety of biological data for laboratory use can be found in Altman's Biology data book (A469), or Fisher's Statistical tables for biological, agricultural and medical research (A474). Data for chemistry and physics may be found in one of the handbooks of the Chemical Rubber Company (E058). A needed statistic can often be located in Agricultural statistics (HI81), issued annually by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Descriptive information about an organism may be found in a regional flora or fauna, or through the Index Kewensis (B057) or the Zoological record (D569). In addition to these specific facts more general information is also often needed for the everyday approach. For instance, annual reviews, texts, and journal articles may be examined for a synthesis of recent developments in a field. In some cases this involves the use of bibliographic tools, but the needed information may just as often be found through browsing or by locating a specific reference suggested by another scientist. Voigt's

14

opinion that bibliographic sources are not heavily or systematically used for the everyday approach seems generally correct. C. The Exhaustive Approach A scientist may need to undertake an exhaustive search of the literature rather infrequently. The first experience with this type of search will occur when writing the doctoral dissertation. In any case, a thorough review of the pertinent literature will be necessary whenever an extensive research project is undertaken. Another literature survey may be done when the results of the work are prepared for publication—thus meeting the formal requirement of most journal editors for a general review of relevant work on the subject previously done by other researchers. Methods of extensive literature searching vary greatly. Some scientists assemble much of the preliminary information needed largely through informal communication with others and then have an assistant undertake the tedious chore of checking bibliographical tools for additional information. Others do much of the searching themselves, as in this way they can evaluate the information while checking through the literature and possibly develop new ideas and approaches as a result. A search at this level can be truly creative. As Dr. E. J. Crane has said: "When a scientist finishes a search, he has far more than a bibliography and notes on existing information; he sees areas that have not been explored and those that have been imperfectly investigated. He comes away from a literature search with a lot of new ideas for experimental work. He may see how to combine existing pieces of information into a new and useful whole that requires little or no experimental work. Nearly all the growth in scientific knowledge has occurred because certain scientists could evaluate previous work and use their creative ability to build on it." 2 3 Well-organized extensive literature searches usually involve the following steps, although they may not always be followed in exactly the same order. 1. Develop a Search Strategy This involves first a definition of the subject to be investigated that includes an analysis of its nature and scope. Some limits as to the period to be covered and comprehensiveness should also usually be placed on the search. For instance, one might decide to cover the standard scientific journals on the subject issued within the last ten years, concluding that a search covering a longer 23 Crane, E.J. 1957. A guide to the literature of chemistry. Wiley, pp. 297-298.

New York:

15

INTRODUCTION

3. Check Library Card Catalogs under Appropriate Subject Headings This effort will often reveal locally available monographs and bibliographies on the subject. The printed subject catalogs of large research libraries other than those in one's immediate vicinity can also be searched. Library card catalogs in the United States do not usually list journal articles because of the magnitude of the job. However, some specialized libraries, particularly those outside of the United States, still attempt to provide separate card entries for journal articles in their collections.

time span and more ephemeral material would not be worthwhile in relation to the effort. There is, of course, no such thing as a 100 percent complete bibliography on any subject. What is usually needed is a listing of the major portion of the really pertinent papers. In addition, a list of appropriate subject headings such as are used in library card catalogs should be noted. These can be found in Subject Headings issued by the Library of Congress and available in almost all libraries. Keywords, terms, and phrases and their synonyms relating to the subject of the search should also be listed, including names of chemical compounds, organisms, trade names, names of equipment and manufacturers, names of countries and institutions where work is done on the subject, and names of persons prominent in the field. This list will often grow as one extends the search and encounters new terminology. These terms will then be employed in searching the printed indexes and the machine-readable data bases of the various documentation services. Many of these services provide lists of terms, often keywords, derived from their own indexing efforts. Some of these are listed in the section of this work concerning "Dictionaries, encyclopedias, thesauri, and lists of terms." As the search proceeds, a checklist should be made of the sources consulted. Pertinent references found will usually be placed on cards. Some scientists place references on punched cards which permit quick access to items listed, through a coding pattern represented by holes and notches on the card. Or, if the number of references is very extensive, they can be transferred to machinereadable form (tape or discs) and thus be available for computer processing. Descriptions of some of these techniques can be found in the following sources: Casey, Robert S. Punched Cards . . . Ed.2. New York: Reinhold, 1958. Doyle, Lauren B. Information retrieval and processing. Los Angeles: Melville, 1975. Foskett, Anthony C. A Guide to personal indexes, using edge-notched, Uniterm and peek-a-boo cards. Ed.2. London: Bingley, 1970. Hayes, Robert M. and Becker, Joseph. Handbook of data processing for libraries. Ed.2. Los Angeles: Melville, 1974.

6. Review What Is Sometimes Called the "Organized" Literature, Consisting of Reviews, Textbooks, and Certain Types of Handbooks or Compendia This material may include a brief description of the subject, an analysis of research already done, and selected lists of references. Reviews may be found in one of the annual review series such as Advances in agronomy or in a regular journal. Review articles are indexed in Index to scientific reviews (A 190), as well as in most of the general indexing and abstracting journals. Some textbooks or compendia have superb selected lists of references. An example for the animal sciences is Reproduction in domestic animals (D320), by Harold H. Cole and Perry T. Cupps. Meticulously organized compendia or handbooks, often based on German scholarship and containing thoroughly researched reviews with extensive bibliographies, are of prime importance, particularly for older material. Examples are P. Sorauer's Handbuch der Pflanzenkrankheiten (B1020) and F. Beilstein's Handbuch der organischen Chemie (E044).

2. Check Pertinent Guides to the Literature Which Describe Important Reference Books Including Bibliographic Sources. Examples are R. T. Bottle's The use of biological literature (A002), Ann E. Kerker's Comparative and veterinary medicine: a guide to the reference literature (D002, and this work. The various bibliographies, listed elsewhere in this work, should also be checked.

7. Conduct a Search for Recent "Unorganized" Material—Journal Articles, Conference Papers, Reports and Bulletins. It is generally agreed that it is best to start with recent material and work backward. Many persons now use the automated data bases for this search, as they cover material from the early 1970s to the present. In the United States the most recent

4. Obtain Advice about Useful Sources from Colleagues and Librarians Who Frequently Conduct Scientific Literature Searches One's best friend in this respect might well be an experienced reference librarian in a good scientific library. 5. Check Personal Card Index and Reprint Files Because of the growth of the literature and lack of time, many researchers no longer maintain such files, which were so common in past decades, but if they are available they may be very useful.

INTRODUCTION

agricultural research, which has not yet been published, can frequently be located by using the CRIS data base (1025) or the more inclusive SSIE data base (1031). Descriptive material about many of these services is available in Gilreath's chapter on "Computerized data bases for bibliographic research." If time permits, it is useful to examine a portion of the printed equivalents of on-line data bases such as the Bibliography of agriculture (A041) or Biological abstracts (A043). Such a manual search may turn up useful references missed in the computer search or alert one to additional terms to use in future computer searches. If computerized service is not available or is too expensive, one would, in any case, use the printed sources. In conducting a search of recent material one should keep in mind that references cited in welldocumented recent papers may lead back to the key publications in the field and that one may, in effect, discover most of the pertinent references needed by following up such citations. In this respect one may use to very good advantage the Institute of Scientific Information's Science citation index (A057), which indexes cited articles. Citation indexing, as it is called, permits the researcher to follow the development of ideas and methods introduced by key scientists in the field and may permit identification of items which cannot be found easily through the sometimes limited subject indexes in other bibliographic services. 8. Conduct a Retrospective Search Covering the Older Literature For many fields, particularly the physical and applied sciences, recent papers may be the only ones of interest and retrospective searches are usually not undertaken. But lengthy searches are sometimes conducted if a scientist wants an exhaustive survey of the field to provide an historical background for the present work. Taxonomists must of necessity refer often to early

16

printed sources for descriptions of an organism. And there are, of course, exceptional cases where the most significant material will be found buried in the earlier literature. Because automated data bases rarely extend to material published before the early 1970s (except for the citation indexing sources), the printed indexing and abstracting journals must be used for retrospective searches. Such manual searches can be tedious and time-consuming, but no alternative method exists. One of the major decisions to be made about exhaustive searches of both recent and retrospective literature is the selection of indexes and abstracts to be searched and the decision when to stop checking additional sources. Agriculture and biology have so many possible sources of information available that in many cases a minimum of three to five may be considered absolutely essential, with up to ten or more necessary for more complete coverage of specialized types of information or longer time periods. For biology and agriculture in general the average scientist in many parts of the world will depend on such services as the Bibliography of agriculture (A041), Biological abstracts (A043), Agrindex (A037), the Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux' abstracting journals, Chemical abstracts (E012), Science citation index (A057), and Index medicus (D025). In addition, scientists in Frenchspeaking parts of the world may use appropriate sections of the Bulletin signaletique (A069) and those in Russia and Eastern Europe the Referativnyi zhurnal (A088). All of these offer, in effect, worldwide documentation services for their subject fields and in most cases cover literature published since World War II or before. The researcher may also use printed library catalogs for earlier material, special subject and local indexes, indexes to governmental and international publications, and the other reference sources described in the following chapters.

OUTLINE

OF

CHAPTER

A

Agriculture and Biology: General J. R I C H A R D

B L A N C H A R D

I. General Bibliographical Sources 19 A. Guides to Agricultural and Biological Reference Works 19 B. Guides to General Reference Sources 20 C. Bibliographies of Bibliographies 20 D. Lists of Agricultural Library Reference Collections 21 E. Informational Bulletins 22 II. Abstracts and Indexes, General Bibliographies 22 A. Lists of Abstracting and Indexing Services 23 B. Publications of International Organizations 23 1. Guides to Publications of International Organizations 23 2. Indexing Publications Issued by FAO 24 C. North America and the British Isles 25 1. Current 25 2. Retrospective 29 D. Western Europe 29 1. France 30 2. Germany 30 3. Italy 31 4. The Netherlands 31 5. Scandinavian Countries 31 6. Spain 32 7. Switzerland 32 E. Eastern Europe 32 1. Czechoslovakia 32 2. Hungary 32

3. Poland 33 4. Romania 33 5. USSR 33 6. Yugoslavia 34 F. Middle East 34 G. Africa 34 H. Asia and the Pacific 35 1. General 36 2. Australia 36 3. China 36 4. India 37 5. Indonesia 37 6. Japan 37 7. Korea 38 8. Pakistan 38 9. The Philippines 38 10. Thailand 38 I. Latin America 38 1. General 39 2. Argentina 39 3. Bolivia 39 4. Brazil 39 5. Central America 40 6. Chile 40 7. Mexico 40 8. Peru 40 9. Venezuela 40 J. Tropical and Sub-Tropical Agriculture 41 K. Arid Lands Agriculture 43 III. Library Catalogs 4S IV. Government Publications 47 A. General 47 B. United States-General 47 17

AGRICULTURE AND BIOLOGY

V. VI. VII.

VIII. IX. X. XI.

XII. XIII.

C. U.S. Agency for International Development 48 D. U.S. Department of AgricultureCurrent 48 E. U.S. Department of Agriculture— Retrospective 48 F. United Kingdom 49 G. Canada 49 H. Australia 49 Review Literature 49 Book Reviews 50 Congresses and Conferences 50 A. Lists and Indexes of Published Proceedings of Congresses and Conferences 51 B. Lists of Future Conferences and Congresses 51 Dissertations 51 Research in Progress 52 Translations 54 Dictionaries, Encyclopedias, Thesauri, and Lists of Terms 55 A. Bibliographies of Dictionaries 55 B. Polylingual Dictionaries 56 C. Monolingual and Bilingual Dictionaries and Encyclopedias 56 1. Arabic 56 2. Chinese 56 3. Czech 56 4. English 56 5. Finnish 58 6. French 58 7. German 58 8. Greek and Latin 58 9. Italian 59 10. Malay 59 11. Polish 59 12. Russian 59 13. Serbo-Croatian 59 14. Spanish 59 D. Thesauri, Lists of Terms 60 Abbreviations 61 Directories 61 A. International 61 1. Directories of Directories 61 2. Directories of Scientific Institutions and Organizations 62 3. Directories of Research Personnel 63 4. Directories of Libraries and Information and Documentation Centers 63 B. North America 63 1. Directory of Directories 63 2. Directories of Scientific Institu-

XIV.

XV. XVI.

XVII.

18

tions and Organizations 63 3. Grant Giving Institutions 64 4. Directories of Research Personnel 65 5. Directories of Libraries 65 C. Great Britain and Ireland 66 D. Europe 66 1. General 66 2. Belgium 67 3. France 67 4. Germany 67 5. The Netherlands 67 6. Scandinavian Countries 67 7. Eastern Europe 67 E. Asia 67 F. Africa 68 G. Latin America 68 Lists of Periodicals 69 A. List of Periodical Directories 70 B. Directories of Periodicals 70 C. Abbreviations of Periodicals 73 Handbooks and Yearbooks 73 Works on Experimental Procedures 74 A. Statistical Methods and Data Books 74 B. Experimental Design 74 C. Laboratory Procedures (Microscopy, etc.) 75 Classification Systems 76

CHAPTER

Agriculture and Biology: General J. R I C H A R D

B L A N C H A R D

The reference works described in this chapter are general compilations that relate to all branches of agriculture and biology. Publications that refer specifically to such subjects as soils and plant pathology are described in following chapters. An attempt is made in the subject chapters to refer back to the appropriate general sources, since a researcher working in a particular field will usually need to use both general sources and subjectoriented works.

General Bibliographical Sources GUIDES TO AGRICULTURAL AND BIOLOGICAL R E F E R E N C E WORKS The following works describe important reference sources of all types, including bibliographies, dictionaries, directories, and handbooks. Some, such as Bottle (A002) and Smith (A007), which are edited by scientists, also provide useful information about methods of literature searching and library use. Works of this type are often employed to lead one quickly to the most pertinent source of information. Blanchard, J. Richard, and Ostvold, Harald. Literature of agricultural research. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1958. 231 p. A001 A selective, annotated bibliography of reference sources. Now out-of-date, but contains useful information about older material not described in Guide to sources for agricultural and biological research. Supplemented by "Agriculture" by J. R. Blanchard, a bibliographic essay published in Bibliography: current state and future trends, part 2, edited by R. B. Downs and F. B. Jenkins (in Library trends 15(4):880-895 (1967).) The same publication also includes an essay on general sources for

biology entitled "Biology," by L. E. Bamber (pp. 829-835).

Bottle, R. T., and Wyatt, H. V., eds. The Use of biological literature. Ed. 2. London: Butterworth; Hamden, Conn.: Archon, 1971. 379 p. (Information Sources for Research and Development) A002 Includes useful and perceptive discussions of literaturesearching methods and surveys of important reference sources by several experts. British slant; focus on general biological subjects such as botany and zoology. Section on food and agriculture rather skimpy.

Bush, E. A. R. Agriculture: a bibliographical guide. London: MacDonald, 1974. 2 v. (The MacDonald Bibliographical Guides) A003 A comprehensive list of 5,644 annotated items, including bibliographies, dictionaries, abstracting services, important periodicals, textbooks, and reference sources. Covers the period 1958-1971, but some earlier material is listed if basic and important. Arrangement is based on the Universal Decimal Classification. Particularly useful for listing of bibliographies published as parts of scientific papers and series. The author is Deputy Librarian of the United Kingdom's Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries, and Food.

Foote, Richard H., and Zidar, Judith. " A Preliminary annotated bibliography of information handling activities in biology." Wash. Acad. Sci. J. 65(1): 19-32 (1975). A004 Lists recent articles about state-of-the-art surveys, data information systems, cataloguing and indexing efforts, and other projects involving information-handling activities in biology by individuals, institutions and societies. Some emphasis given to zoology and entomology, reflecting the interests of the chief author, who is an entomologist. Arranged by author with an index by broad subject categories.

Lendvay, Olga. Primer for agricultural libraries. Ed. 2, rev, and enl. Wageningen, The 19

A006-A013

AGRICULTURE AND

Netherlands: Centre for Agricultural Publishing and Documentation, 1980. 91 p. A005 Supersedes preliminary edition by Dorothy Parker. Useful guide for those organizing a small agricultural library or reference collection. The following appendices are of value for lists of reference sources: V—Current reviews; VI—Current bibliographies, indexes and abstract journals; VII—Guides to literature sources and directories; VIII—Specialized agricultural bibliographies; IX—Some important current agricultural journals.

Owen, Dolores B., and Hanchey, Marguerite M. Abstracts and indexes in science and technology: a descriptive guide. Metuchen, N.J.: Scarecrow Press, 1974. 154 p. A006 Not comprehensive, but provides useful information about more important abstracting and indexing services, including those for biology and agriculture.

Smith, Roger C., Reid, W. Malcolm, and Luchsinger, A. E. Smith's guide to the literature of the life sciences. Ed. 9. Minneapolis: Burgess, 1980. 223 p. A007 Important reference sources and methods of literature searching are described by experienced scientists. Early editions covered zoology only, but scope now broadened to cover biology in general. Very useful for students and beginning researchers.

Singhvi, M. L., and Shrimali, D. S. Reference sources in agriculture, an annotated bibliography. Udaipur, India: Rajasthan College of Agriculture, Consumers' Co-operative Society, 1962. 418 p. A008 Lists 1,431 items. Mimeographed format. Now out-of-date, but useful for Indian material. Review: Hon. Abslr. 33:666.

United Nations. Industrial Development Corporation. UNIDO guides to information sources. No. 1- (1972-). New York: United Nations, 1972-. A009 Compiled to promote the use of industrial information in developing countries. Provides lists of organizations, directories, sources of statistics, basic handbooks, monographs, periodicals, abstracting and indexing periodicals, dictionaries and encyclopedias, bibliographies, and other sources of information in the fields covered. Those of interest to agriculture and related fields include: Number 1, Information sources on the meat processing industry; Number 7, Information sources on the vegetable oil processing industry; Number 8, Information sources on the agricultural implements and machinery industry; Number 10, Information sources on the pesticide industry; Number 11, Information sources on the pulp and paper industry; Number 13, Information sources on the animal feed industry; Number 19, Information sources on the canning industry; Number 23, Information sources on the dairy product manufacturing industry; Number 25, Information sources on the beer and wine industry; Number 27, Information sources on the packaging industry; Number 28, Information sources on the coffee, cocoa, tea and spices industry.

GUIDES TO GENERAL REFERENCE SOURCES For descriptions of general reference sources of all types and covering all fields one should consult

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20

the following publications. The compilations by Sheehy (A012) and Walford (A013) are the most complete and useful, including information about dictionaries, encyclopedias, directories, biographical compilations, statistical sources, and other types of reference works as well as abstracting and indexing services. Each has a section for science, although their listings for agriculture and biology are incomplete. One might also refer to LouiseNoëlle Malclès's Les Sources du travail bibliographique (Geneva: E. Droz, 1950-1958. 3 v. in 4), which is out-of-date but still useful for European material. The International Federation for Documentation (FID) is compiling for publication an annotated guide to guides to reference books and other services. American reference books annual (1970-). Littleton, Colo.: Libraries Unlimited, 1970-. A010 Reviews new reference books published in the United States. The editors' definition of reference books is broad, and howto-do-it books for public library use, which would not normally be in a research library's collection, are often included. Covers all fields of science, including agriculture.

Maichel, Karol. Guide to Russian reference books. V. 5, Science, technology and medicine. Stanford, Ca.: Stanford University, Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace, 1967. 384 p. (Hoover Institution Bibliographical series, 32) A011 Selective annotated guide covering biology, agriculture, and other branches of science. One of the best sources of information for Russian works of this type, although now dated.

Sheehy, Eugene P. Guide to reference books. Ed. 9. Chicago: American Library Association, 1976. 1015 p. A012 Revised version of C. M. Winchell's 8th ed. Selective annotated guide. Excellent for general works and material on social sciences and humanities; partial coverage for science; very incomplete for agriculture.

Walford, A. J., ed. Guide to reference material. Ed. 2 and 3. London: Library Association, 197075. 3 v. A013 Volume 1, Science and technology, ed. 3 (1973); volume 2, Social and historical sciences, philosophy and religion, ed. 3 (197S); volume 3, Generalities, languages, the arts and literature, ed. 2 (1970). A valuable selective guide arranged by Universal Decimal Classification. International in scope, but emphasizes material published in Britain. Thorough annotations, with references to reviews when available. Better than Sheehy (A012) for agriculture.

B I B L I O G R A P H I E S OF B I B L I O G R A P H I E S This type of work is often useful for the identification of published bibliographies pertinent to one's research; the use of such a bibliography can save a great deal of time when conducting an extensive retrospective search. Additional general bibliographies of bibliographies, such as the Biblio-

21

AGRICULTURE

graphic index, are described in Sheehy (AO 12) and Walford (A013). Besterman, Theodore. A World bibliography of bibliographies and of bibliographical catalogues, calendars, abstracts, digests, indexes and the like. Ed. 4. Lausanne: Societas Bibliographica, 1965. 5 v. A014 A m o n u m e n t a l and uncritical list of a b o u t 85,000 separately published bibliographies issued u p to 1963. Incomplete for agriculture, but still useful (although it includes m a n y e p h e m e r a l items and excludes s o m e publications of importance). Sections of this work were published separately in 1971 as Agriculture; a bibliography of bibliographies and Biological sciences; a bibliography of bibliographies ( R o w m a n and Littleñeld, Totowa, N.J.). A supplement by Alice F. T o o m e y , entitled A World list of bibliographies: 1964-1974: a list of works. ..: a decennial supplement to Theodore Besterman. . . , was published by R o w m a n and Littleñeld in 1977.

Bibliography of agricultural bibliographies, 1977. A categorized listing of bibliographies indexed in AGRICOLA. Comp. by Charles N. Beebe, Automated Retrieval Section, National Agricultural Library. Beltsville, Md.: U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, Science and Education Administration, Technical Information Systems, U.S. National Agricultural Library, 1978. 343 p. (Bibliographies and Literature of Agriculture BLA—1/1977). A015 " T h i s publication is intended to be the first of an a n n u a l bibliography of agricultural bibliographies derived f r o m A G R I C O L A . Citations were pulled f r o m the A G R I C O L A citation data base online. They represent English language references only; foreign language titles were excluded in o r d e r to keep this publication to a manageable size. . . . Generally those d o c u m e n t s . . . were selected which included bibliographic references equivalent to t h r e e pages. Exceptions were m a d e when a smaller bibliography represented a substantive offering on a select subject. Literature received m o r e than o n e year after publication is generally not indexed; exceptions are m a d e for important scientific publications. Citations f r o m the F o o d and Nutrition Information and Educational Materials C e n t e r and f r o m t h e American Agricultural Economics D o c u m e n t a tion C e n t e r a r e excluded. S o m e duplication of citation appears because t h e system requires separate indexing and cataloging entries for series publication" (Preface). Arranged by broad subject categories as used in the Bibliography of agriculture. A u t h o r index. Useful, but a m o r e careful selection of entries and a m o r e detailed a r r a n g e m e n t will be desirable.

Bridson, Gavin, and Harvey, Anthony P. "A Checklist of natural history bibliographies and bibliographical scholarship, 1966-1970." Journal of the Society for the 'Bibliography of Natural History, 5(6)428-467 (1971). A016

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A014-A021

Lists s o m e of t h e guides and standard bibliographies for agriculture, with annotations. T h e list of current agricultural journals is selective.

Internationale Bibliographie der Fachbibliographien für Technik, Wissenschaft und Wirtschaft. Ausgabe A: Einmalig erscheinende Bibliographien. International bibliography of bibliographies in techniques, science and economics, edition A. Ed. 9. München-Pullach: Verlag Dokumentation, 1969. 887 p. (Handbuch der technischen Dokumentation und Bibliographie, Bd. 3) A018 Lists non-serial bibliographies. Classified a r r a n g e m e n t . Extensive listing, but lack of indexes and a n n o t a t i o n s limits usefulness.

Lauche, Rudolf. Internationales Handbuch der Bibliographien des Landbaues. World bibliography of agricultural bibliographies. München: Bayerischer Landwirtschaftsverlag, 1957.411 p. A019 C o m p r e h e n s i v e , classified list of 4,157 items published between 1596 and 1957. Supplements appeared f r o m 1956 to 1971 in "Bibliographical news: new agricultural bibliograp h i e s , " compiled by staffs of the U.S. National Agricultural Library, U.S. D e p a r t m e n t of Agriculture, and the Library of the Lanbouwhoogeschool at Wageningen, T h e Netherlands, and published in the Quarterly bulletin (A027) of the International Association of Agricultural Librarians and Documentalists. T h e "Bibliographical n e w s " section was also supplem e n t e d by Bibliography of agricultural bibliographies, 1961-1970 (A021), which was compiled by the Library staff at Wageningen and published o n microfiche.

Mikheev, Nikolai Mikhaiiovich. Bibliograficheskie ukazateli sel'skokhoziaistvennoi literatury, 1783-1954, gody. Moskva: Sel'khozgiz, 1956. 192 p. A020 A selective bibliography of bibliographies of Russian agricult u r e for the period indicated. Also includes bibliographies of, and indexes to, agricultural journals, and personal data o n 55 agriculturists. Published u n d e r auspices of T s e n t r a r n a i a sel'skokhoziaistvennaia Biblioteka (Central Agricultural Library, Moscow).

Wageningen. Landbouwhoogeschool. Bibliotheek. Bibliography of agricultural bibliographies, 1961-1970, 1971-1972. Zug, Switzerland: Inter-Documentation, 1973, 1977. 163 microfiche in 3 boxes, 59 microfiche in 1 box. A021

Useful s o u r c e for hard-to-find bibliographical material o n plant and animal sciences for period covered. N o a n n o t a t i o n s or index. A r r a n g e d geographically.

Supplements the "Bibliographical n e w s " section (last issued in vol. 16 for 1971, no. 3 / 4 ) of the Quarterly bulletin (A027) of the International Association of Agricultural Librarians and Documentalists. Arranged by Universal Decimal Classification n u m b e r . N o indexes. Contains a b o u t 95,000 bibliographical entries for items received by t h e library of the Agricultural College at Wageningen, T h e Netherlands.

Harvey, Anthony P. "Agricultural research literature; a bibliography of selected guides and periodicals.'' Agricultural research index (Guernsey, British Isles), 2:957-1043 (1970). A017

LISTS OF AGRICULTURAL LIBRARY REFERENCE COLLECTIONS Lists of this type reflect the needs of the library's clientele and are often useful in determining the more important sources for research.

A022-A027

AGRICULTURE

Guide to bibliographic aids. St. Paul: University of Minnesota, St. Paul Campus Libraries, 1971. 64 p. A022 Prepared by the staff of a major agricultural library. Lists principal subject headings used in the card catalog, abstract journals, and indexes in the various pertinent fields and representative journals for each subject field in agriculture and biology.

Instituto Interamericano de Ciencias Agrícolas. Colección de referencia de la Biblioteca Conmemorativa Orton. Ed. 2, rev. Turrialba, Costa Rica. 1967. 181 p. (Bibliotecologia y documentación no. 1) A023 Lists principal reference works in a good agricultural library. Particularly useful for Latin American material.

Rose, Barbara. Agriculture and biology, selected reference sources in Mann Library. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Libraries, Albert R. Mann Library, 1970. 42 p. A024 Guide to important reference publications in a large academic agricultural library.

Wageningen. Landbouwhoogeschool. Bibliotheek. Catalogue of current bibliographies in the reference room of the Central Library of the Agricultural University (including a few discontinued titles). Ed. 2. Wageningen, The Netherlands, 1974. 99 p. A025 Lists 813 bibliographical items from one of the world's best agricultural libraries. No annotations. Subject and geographical indexes.

INFORMATIONAL BULLETINS The following serial publications are of particular value to the documentalist or librarian who wishes to have recent information about new publications, documentation services, and bibliographies in the fields of agriculture and biology. More general publications of this type which are also useful include the NFAIS newsletter (issued by the National Federation of Abstracting and Indexing Services), Information hotline, Information reports and bibliographies, Special libraries, ASLIB proceedings, and Sci-tech news. Agricultural libraries information notes. V. 1(1975-). Beltsville, Md.: U.S. National Agricultural Library, 1975-. A026 Monthly. Includes recent information about documentation services for agriculture, important new publications, bibliographies and translations, and activities of N A L . Also has list of forthcoming agricultural conferences.

International Association of Agricultural Librarians and Documentalists. Quarterly bulletin. V. 1- (1956-). Harpenden, Herts., Eng., 1956-1960; Oxford, 1961-July 1970; Bennekom, The Netherlands, Oct. 1970-1973; Lunteren, The Netherlands, 1974-1976; Beltsville, Md.: U.S. National Agricultural Library, 1977-. A027

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T h e "Bibliographical n e w s " section, which appeared in volume 1 (1956) through volume 16 (1971), listed " N e w agricultural serials," a supplement to Current agricultural serials: a world list (1965-67) (A439) and " N e w agricultural bibliographies," a supplement to Dr. Rudolf Lauche's Internationales Handbuch der Bibliographien Landbaues (A019). Also contains many valuable articles on agricultural documentation and libraries. Editor, f r o m 1956 through July 1970, D. H. Boalch of England; f r o m Oct. 1970 through 1976, G. de Bruyn of The Netherlands; since 1977, Richard A. Farley, Director of the U.S. National Agricultural Library.

Abstracts and Indexes, General Bibliographies According to the Boyle and Buntrock Survey of the world agricultural documentation services (A028), 124 title and 230 abstracting services for agriculture and related fields were issued in 41 countries in the year 1971. The majority of these services publish indexing and abstracting journals, although some provide service only from machine-readable data bases and do not issue journals. The printed sources listed here cover agriculture and biology in general, and range from publications international in scope and application to those that serve strictly regional or national concerns. Their aim is usually to provide title citations and/or abstracts of current material for the fields covered. They are also useful for retrospective searching if the necessary cumulated indexes are available. Abstracting services provide a succinct description of the contents of each item. Such abstracts, often prepared by specialists, may be informative enough that there will be no need to see the original publication. The services providing only title citations list bibliographical information about the items indexed, or reproduce current title pages of journals. Most of the major services now place their data in machine-readable form and provide computerized searching services as well as printed indexing and abstracting journals. Services with the most widespread use and coverage include the Bibliography of agriculture (A041), the Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux's abstracting journals, and Biological abstracts (A043). These are accompanied by the AGRICOLA (1019), CAB (1023), and BIOSIS (1022) previews, mechanized data bases which are described in Chapter I. A recent comparative study of these three computer-based systems (Mary L. Cittadino and others, "Three computer-based bibliographic retrieval systems for scientific literature," Bioscience 27(11):739-42) demonstrated that each had certain strengths and weaknesses and that it is advisable to use all three of them in a comprehensive search, as each produces valuable unique references in spite of some duplication. Two more general services, Agrindex

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(A037) and Science citation index (A057), are receiving increasing use and are also of first importance. The researcher can usually determine which service or services are most appropriate for his needs only after extensive use. An attempt is made in this section to group the general abstracting and indexing services and bibliographies covering agriculture and biology into geographic and other categories. Services covering more specific subject areas are described in the appropriate later chapters. LISTS OF ABSTRACTING AND INDEXING SERVICES The most recent and complete list of agricultural and biological documentation services is the Boyle and Buntrock Survey. . . (A028). Separate lists of abstracting and indexing journals of all types can also be found in Ulrich's international periodicals directory. . . (A454) and its companion volume Irregular serials and annuals (A441). Boyle, P. J., and Buntrock, H. Survey of the world agricultural documentation services. Prepared on behalf of the FAO panel of experts on " A G R I S " (International Information System for the Agricultural Sciences and Technology) and of the Working Group for Agricultural Documentation and Information of the European Communities. [Rome]: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Documentation Centre, 1973. 219 p. (FAO/DC/AGRIS 6; EUR 4680/ie) A028 Additional indexes to the survey of the world documentation services. Luxembourg: Commission of the European Communities, 1974. 46 p. (EUR 4680/1 Suppl. 1) A029 A survey conducted to provide background information for the d e v e l o p m e n t of A G R I S (A028) and (A029). G i v e s descriptive and statistical data for 124 title and 230 abstract services operating in 41 countries, with a total a n n u a l output of 632,000 title citations and 1,137,000 abstracts. Sponsored and sold by the C o m m i s s i o n of the European C o m m u n i t i e s , 29, rue Aldringen, L u x e m b o u r g . I n f o r m a t i o n was compiled by questionnaire, in or b e f o r e 1971. It is s o m e t i m e s incomplete, and many of t h e services described have since disappeared or changed their names. But this is still the most useful and c o m plete recent survey.

Burgess, G. Inventory of abstracting and indexing services produced in the U.K. London: British Library, Research and Development Dept., 1978. 96 p. A030 Frauendorfer, Sigmund von. Survey of abstracting services and current bibliographical tools in agriculture, forestry, fisheries, nutrition, veterinary medicine and related subjects. München: BLV Verlagsgesellschaft, [1969]. 192 p. A031

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A028-A035

Originally sponsored by FAO. First part discusses scope and uses of agricultural literature and problems in the preparation of abstracting and indexing services; still very useful. T h e second part is an international list of abstracting and indexing services which is now very out-of-date.

International Federation for Documentation. Abstracting services. Ed. 2. The Hague, The Netherlands: 1969. 2 v. A032 V o l u m e 1 provides information on 1,300 abstracting services for science, technology, medicine, and agriculture. Subject and country indexes. N e e d s to be revised.

Internationale Bibliographie der Fachbibliographien ffir Technik, Wissenschaft und Wirtschaft. Ausgabe B. Periodisch ershienende Bibliographien. International bibliography of bibliographies in techniques, science and economics, edition B. Ed. 2. München-Pullach: Verlag Dokumentation, 1969. 817 p. (Handbuch der technischen Dokumentation und Bibliographie, Bd. 3B) A033 Lists bibliographies, especially indexing and abstracting journals, that appear as serials. Classified a r r a n g e m e n t . N o indexes or annotations.

PUBLICATIONS OF INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) issues many publications concerning all aspects of the world's agricultural situation. The principal indexing services for its publications are listed here, along with information about Agrindex (A037), which lists world wide agricultural literature as well as items produced by FAO. One should keep in mind that many FAO publications are also listed in other general indexing and abstracting services. Many other international organizations such as Unesco publish occasional items of interest to agriculture and biology. Information about their publications as well as those from FAO can be found in the three guides listed below. GUIDES TO PUBLICATIONS OF INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATIONS

Dimitrov, Théodore D. Documents of international organisations: a bibliographic handbook covering the United Nations and other intergovernmental organisations. London: International University Publications; Chicago: American Library Association, 1973. 301 p. A034 C o m p r e h e n s i v e listing of current catalogs and indexes of international organizations.

International bibliography, information, documentation. V. 1 (1973-). New York: Unipub (a Xerox company), 1973-. A035 Quarterly. Lists publications of international organizations, including m a n y items concerning agriculture and related fields.

A036-A040

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The "Bibliographic r e c o r d " section lists items by broad subject classification and provides abstracts. The "Periodicals r e c o r d " section lists periodicals alphabetically, with brief descriptions of their scope. Contains useful information on how to acquire publications from the various agencies. Indexes of subjects and periodicals listed.

Winton, Harry N. M. Publications of the United Nations system: a reference guide. New York: Bowker, 1972. 202 p. A036 Describes various international organizations of the United Nations and their Drincipal reference publications.

INDEXING PUBI.1CATIONS ISSUED BY FAO

Agrindex. V. 1- (1975-). Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, AGRIS Coordinating Center, v. 1-2 (1975-1976); Bucaresti, Romania: Apimondia, v. 3- (1977-). A037 Monthly. A computer-produced citation index to world wide recorded agricultural information. One of the products of the International Information System for the Agricultural Sciences and Technology (AGRIS) of FAO. Material covered. All fields of agriculture including fisheries and forestry. The total data base included about 230,000 items by the end of 1977. T h e number of items indexed has been increasing each year f r o m the base of 48,432 included in volume 1, which appeared in 1975. It is expected that 200,000 items will be covered annually by 1979 All F A O publications are fully indexed. In addition input is supplied by 92 participating countries (as of October 1977), s o m e of which report material through regional centers. These include such centers as the Inter-American Center for Agricultural Documentation and Information in Costa Rica (CIDIA), for Latin America and the Caribbean; the Agricultural Information Bank for Asia in the Philippines (AIBA), for s o m e of the Asian countries; and the European C o m m u n i t i e s for its nine m e m b e r states. T h e National Agricultural Library of the U.S. Department of Agriculture contributes about 3,000 entries a m o n t h f r o m major U.S. sources. T h e Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux (CAB) provides input (limited to citations f r o m periodical literature) for the United Kingdom, Canada, and New Zealand, with Australia and India reporting separately. A current list of the participating national and regional centers is provided in each issue. Arrangement and format. Entries are arranged alphabetically by author under subject categories and commodity codes. Information provided for each entry includes: AGRIS reference n u m b e r , a u t h o r , author affiliation, corporate entry, title in English, original language title if not in English, report or patent n u m b e r , additional document numbers, journal title, abbreviations, imprint, collation, notes providing additional information if relevant, conference title with place and date, and address or code of contributing center f r o m which a nonconventional document can be obtained. Subject categories and commodity codes precede the table of contents; they are given in French and Spanish as well as English. Indexes are provided in each issue for personal authors, corporate entries, report and patent n u m b e r s , and commodities. A cumulative author and subject index for volumes 1-3 (1975-1977) has been published in five volumes. As of volume 2, n u m b e r 12 (December, 1976), the commodity index carries titles and is arranged alphabetically by commodity names within subject categories. Special features and services. If original material available in a local library or f r o m the contributing cated in the citation, it may be requested through loan services (including photo-reproduction) f r o m

cited is not center indiinter-library major agri-

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cultural libraries and documentation centers of the Worldwide Network of Agricultural Libraries (AGLINET), coordinated by FAO. A list of these libraries is provided in each issue of Agrindex. Literature not usually available through normal distribution channels (such as certain technical reports) can usually be obtained through the issuing organization, which is indicated by an asterisk in the last part of the entry in the main section of Agrindex. A magnetic tape service containing all references in the bibliography is available to participating governments and organizations. See the entry for AGRIS (1020) in Chapter I for m o r e information. Background information and critical comment. An impressive international effort to index the world's agricultural literature. It became operational in 1975 after five years of planning and experimentation. T h e AGRIS Coordinating Centre of F A O has developed Agrindex and other services within the conceptual framework of UNISIST, the Unesco Programme of International Cooperation in Scientific and Technical Information. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), together with the International Nuclear Information System (INIS), is providing facilities in Vienna for computer data processing, by agreement with FAO. Various articles that provide extensive information about the A G R I S projects appear in the International Association of Agricultural Librarians and Documentalists' Quarterly bulletin, volume 22, number 2 (1976), and volume 22 (?), n u m b e r 1/2 (1977). An additional useful article is " A G R I S , " by Joseph F. Caponio and Leila Moran, in Science 187:233-236 (Jan. 24, 1975). The potential value of Agrindex is great as it may eventually form one of the largest data bases for agriculture. At present its value is hard to assess, as most agricultural researchers continue to use older services such as the C A B abstracts, Biological abstracts (A043) and the Bibliography of agriculture (A041), particularly because the subject indexing is limited. As it develops, however, the printed issues may prove quite useful for current awareness purposes, and eventually the tape should be valuable for retrospective searching. Some researchers in highly developed countries may find that the AGRIS service includes much material that is not pertinent to their research, since it comes from developing countries. On the other hand, it may be of great value for s o m e countries where the agricultural literature was not adequately listed before. Several m o r e years' trial and experience are necessary before the AGRIS services and their relationship to other indexing eflorts for agriculture can be evaluated adequately. Continuation of AGRIS was recommended in an independent appraisal which was conducted, N o v e m b e r 1976—March 1977, by Unesco at the request of FAO. (Badran, O. A., and others. UNISIST report on the independent appraisal of AGRIS organized by UNESCO. . . . Paris: Unesco, 1977).

Bibliographic catalogue of FAO publications (1945-1972). Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, 1973. 151 p. A038 Lists all publications for the period covered, with prices. Arranged by broad subject. Special list of vocabularies, directories, bibliographies, and catalogues. Author, subject, and title indexes. Next edition will cover the period f r o m 1945 to 1976.

FAO books in print, 1976-77. Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, 1976. 87 p. A039 Lists current publications available for purchase. Arranged by broad subject. Revised periodically.

FAO documentation: current bibliography. Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Documentation Center, 1967-. A040

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Monthly. Title varies: F AO documentation: current index (19671971). A computer-produced annotated list of F A O publications with annually cumulated author and subject (KWIC) indexes. Geographical index incorporated in subject index. T h e Documentation Center also provides, free of charge, selective bibliographies of F A O d o c u m e n t s on request. A microfiche edition of F A O publications is available f r o m the F A O Library, Reference and Documentary Information Division, FAO, Rome. Photocopies or originals for separate documents may be ordered f r o m FAO, R o m e , or f r o m F A O ' s United States outlet, UNIPUB, Box 433, Murray Hill Station, New York, N.Y. 10016. FAO documentation . . . was preceded by Quarterly list. Publications and main documents (1962-1966). F A O ' s documents were listed in the United Nation's documents index (now superseded by UNdex) f r o m 1950 to 1962. International bibliography, information, documentation (A035), published f r o m 1973 to date, lists selected F A O publications as well as agricultural publications f r o m other international agencies. F A O publications on certain specific subjects, usually covering the period from 1945 to 1970 or 1971 have been listed in a series of "Special i n d e x e s " which are noted in Dimitrov's Documents of international organisations: a bibliographic handbook (A034); most will have separate entries in the appropriate chapters of this guide.

NORTH AMERICA AND THE BRITISH ISLES The more general documentation services for agriculture and biology published in North America and the British Isles are listed together, as they are used interchangeably by scientists who read English. They are often international in scope. CURRENT

Bibliography of agriculture. V. 1- (1942-). Washington, D.C.: U.S. Dept. of Agriculture Library, for sale by the Superintendent of Documents, Govt. Printing Office, v. 1, no. 1-v. 26, no. 6 (1942-1962); Washington, D.C.: National Agricultural Library, U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, for sale by the Superintendent of Documents, Govt. Printing Office, v. 26, no. 7-v. 33, no. 12 (1962-1969); New York: CCM Information, v. 34-v. 35 (1970-1971); New York: Macmillan Information, v. 36-v. 38 (1972-1974); Phoenix, Az.: Oryx Press, v. 39- (1975-). A041 Monthly. Supersedes the bibliographical publications issued by the Bureau Libraries of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Content derived f r o m computerized bibliographic data files known collectively as A G R I C O L A (AGRICultural On-Line Access) (1019), which are distributed by the NAL. Material covered. T h e data base includes citations f r o m important world literature in agricultural and allied sciences received by N A L , as well as some items on non-agricultural subjects which meet the diverse needs of agricultural scientists and administrators. Over 140,000 items were added to the A G R I C O L A file in 1977, making a total of m o r e than 1,000,000 items in the data base covering the period f r o m 1970 through 1977. Data input is provided by the following units: 1. National Agricultural Library (NAL). Provides about 123,000 indexing records per year f r o m about 6,000 journal titles, as well as conference papers, book analytics, U S D A publications, United States state experiment station and extension service publications, and foreign experiment station publications. F A O publications received in hard copy are also indexed.

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A041-A042

Books, new serials, and certain other material catalogued by N A L are announced in the National Agricultural Library catalog (A171). 2. Food and Nutrition Center (FNIC). Has produced about 11,000 references since 1970. Principally covers topics concerned with applied nutrition, nutrition education and management of food services. Data input has been included in the Bibliography of agriculture (B of A) since 1973. 3. American Agricultural Economics Documentation Center ( A A E D C ) . Indexes publications produced in the U.S. and Canada related to agricultural economics. Begun in 1972. The Center has included its data in the B of A since April 1977. Arrangement and Content. Contents are arranged as follows: list of journal title abbreviations cited; main entry section (grouped by 76 broad subject categories); U S D A publications (arranged by series); state agricultural experiment station publications; state agricultural extension service publications; F A O publications; translated publications; indexes. T h e main entry section provides full bibliographic entries for citations added to the A G R I C O L A data base the preceding month. Arrangement within categories is by journal title to permit rapid scanning of articles f r o m journals indexed. Most entries begin with a sixdigit identification n u m b e r assigned sequentially throughout a volume year. If an entry is assigned to two categories, only the entry in the primary category carries the identification number. This number serves as the unique identifier for an item in the various indexes. Additional information in a citation includes the N A L call n u m b e r , title of articles (in English with the original language indicated in parentheses), author(s), journal title abbreviation, volume/issue n u m b e r , pagination, and date of publication. English summaries and references are noted if they are available. Indexes appear monthly and are cumulated annually in the following sections: geographic index, corporate author index, personal author index, and subject index. The subject index is based on keywords found in titles, plus terms which are added by indexers to enrich titles which are otherwise ambiguous or meaningless. Agricultural terms (A304) reflects the significant terms used in the B of A. The Oryx Press has announced the publication in the fall of 1978 of Bibliography of agriculture retrospective cumulation on microfiche, 1970-1977 (vols. 34-41), which will cumulate entries and indexes into a single integrated file for the period indicated. Annual updates on microfiche will also be available. Special services provided. Interlibrary loan and photocopy services are provided on request by N A L and FNIC. SDI and on-line services using the A G R I C O L A data base are available f r o m Lockheed Information Systems, System Development Corporation, Bibliographic Retrieval Service, and certain other commercial and academic institutions. See the section on A G R I C O L A (1019) in Chapter I. Critical comment. A comprehensive and indispensable index to the world's literature. Strengths: large data base and availability of material listed from NAL. Weaknesses: timeconsuming to use because of a m o u n t of material covered and arrangement. This can now be overcome, however, by using on-line retrieval services for the A G R I C O L A data base. The printed Bibliography of agriculture will continue to be of primary importance as a current check-list by subject and by type of publication, and for retrospective searching for material indexed before 1970 (when the automated data base was started). It will also be useful for brief searches for specific items indexed after 1970. It will, of course, be used for retrospective searching for material indexed after 1970 by those who cannot afford or do not have access to on-line services.

Biodeterioration research titles, quarterly index of biodeterioration (1966-). Birmingham, Eng.: T h e University of Ashton in Birmingham, Department of Biological Sciences, Biodeterioration Information Centre, 1966-. A042 Quarterly. Title citations f r o m about 200 primary journals and

A043-A045

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secondary sources concerning biological deterioration of materials, including wood, agricultural produce, foodstuffs, biological fouling (including fouling of waterways by water weeds), and biological degradation of pesticides. Arranged by subject. Retrospective retrieval, photocopies, and translations available.

Biological abstracts. V. 1- (1926-). Philadelphia: Bio Sciences Information Service of Biological Abstracts (BIOSIS), 1926-. A043 Semimonthly. A continuation of Abstracts of bacteriology (1917-1925) and Botanical abstracts (1918-1926). BIOSIS's printed reference publication, which provides abstracts in English of current research reports from the biological and biomedical literature. Material covered. Abstracts material from about 8,000 serial and non-serial publications. Approximately 149,000 items are reported annually. More than 6,000 abstracts per issue. Emphasis given to basic research papers from primary biological and biomedical journals. Geographic distribution of the literature covered in 1976 was: 50% from Europe and the Middle East, 24% from North America, 15% from Asia and Austral, 7% from South and Central America, and 4% from Africa. Content and arrangement. Abstracts arranged by numeric sequence under 84 different subject headings. Citations include author's name and affiliation, title in English, source title, part numbers, inclusive pagination, and annotations. The abstract is in English with initials of volunteer abstracters, if appropriate. Indexes as described below are available in each issue and are cumulated in each volume (2 vols, a year, 1972 to date). Cumulated indexes from 1970-1974 (Biofiche V, series 1) are also available on microfiche. Indexes: (1) Author (personal or corporate). May include up to 10 authors of a given report. (2) Biosystematic index. Includes any taxonomic category at a level higher than genus-species (class, order, family). A new taxon is identified by an asterisk. A major "Broad research area" is indicated for each entry. (3) Generic index. Genus level species listed alphabetically. Each taxon or record is identified by an asterisk and/or code letter. A major "Broad research area" is indicated for each entry. (4) Concept (Cross) index. Uses more than 600 broad subject headings as "broad areas of research" concepts. Each BA report is indexed (on the average) under 5 such headings. (5) BIOSIS subject index. A keyword in context (KWIC) index, listing alphabetically all significant words from the title (with exception of genus species names). Keywords are displayed in context by showing preceding and succeeding words. Descriptive words are added if necessary by BIOSIS staff. Special features and services. SDI and on-line retrospective searching services (BIOSIS Previews) for material indexed since 1972 (and since 1970 from one supplier) are available via numerous service centers. (See Chapter I.) Other products produced from the taped data base include Biological abstracts/RRM (A044), Abstracts of mycology (B1108), Abstracts of entomology (D828), and Abstracts on health effects of environmental pollutants (G013). Bioresearch today is a general title for a group of monthly abstracting journals covering 14 specific research topics. Each issue contains between 100 and 250 abstracts selected from two issues of Biological abstracts (BA). They are designed as current check-lists rather than for retrospective searching and are appropriate for users who do not have access to BA or who wish to see abstracts regularly in only a limited specific field. Complete files of BA are available on microfilm. Supplementary publications include: Serial sources . . . (A449), A guide to the vocabulary of biological literature (A305), BIOSIS search guide, BIOSIS Previews edition, BIOSIS technical topics, and Bioscene. BIOSIS also provides free explanatory pamphlets about its services. Critical comment. BA and its various supporting services form one of the most important information systems available for

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biology, agriculture, and related fields. Widely used as a check-list of current material and for retrospective searching. In the future those doing extensive retrospective searches will probably use the printed BA from 1926 to 1972 and BIOSIS Previews (1022) from 1972 to date. The printed sources will also continue to be used for current checking of new material in specific fields. Authors' abstracts are used or modified if acceptable; otherwise abstracts are usually prepared by specialists on the BA staff. BA cooperates with Chemical abstracts (E012) in the sharing of abstracts and in efforts to reduce unnecessary duplication, particularly in the fields of biochemistry and biomedicine. It also cooperates with other abstracting services through the National Federation of Sciences Abstracting and Indexing Services and the International Council of Scientific Unions Abstracting Board. William C. Steere's Biological abstracts/BIOSlS. The first fifty years. The evolution of a major science information service (New York: Plenum Press, 1976) provides information about the history, development, and mechanization of BIOSIS services.

Biological abstracts/RRM. V. 1- (1965-). Philadelphia: Biosciences Information Service of Biological Abstracts (BIOSIS), 1965-. A044 Monthly. Issued as Bioresearch titles, 1965-1966, Bioresearch index, 1967-1979. Includes material not covered in Biological abstracts and serves as a supplementary service to it. Material covered. Includes over 8,000 serial and non-serial publications. Approximately 113,000 items reported annually. Indexes reviews, proceedings of meetings, reports, translated journals, books since 1980, and other miscellaneous items not indexed in the companion service. RRM stands for reports, reviews, meetings. Content and arrangement. Had a contents page format for quick literature checking through 1979. Since January 1980 it has had approximately the same arrangement by subject as Biological abstracts except content summaries are provided rather than abstracts. Beginning with January 1980 includes new section, "Book synopses," which replaces " B o o k s " section in Biological abstracts. The five indexes—author, biosystematic, generic, concept, and subject are in the same format as those for Biological abstracts (BA), and were cumulated annually until 1978 and semi-annually beginning in 1978. Special services. Same as those for BA. Material in Biological abstracts/RRM also included in the BIOSIS computerized data base, BIOSIS previews (1022), which is the base for SDI and on-line services. Critical comments. Originally designed to list the backlog of material for which space was not available in BA itself. This separation of material from BA, although undoubtedly necessary, is not always successful: some of it deserves the full BA abstracting treatment and some should, perhaps, not be listed at all. Nevertheless, because of the material covered, Biological abstracts/RRM should be used to supplement BA for extensive searches unless one uses the automated data bases.

Biological & agricultural index, a cumulative subject index to periodicals in the fields of biology, agriculture and related sciences. V. 1(1916-). New York: H. W. Wilson, 1919-. A045 Monthly, except August. Cumulated quarterly and annually from September 1964 to date. Cumulated triannually 1916August 1964. Service offered on subscription basis. Title was Agricultural index (1916-1964). Material covered. Indexes 185 primary journals in English concerning the fields of agricultural chemicals, agricultural economics, agricultural engineering, agriculture and agricultural research, animal husbandry, bacteriology, biochemistry, biology, botany, conservation, dairying and dairy products, ecology, entomology, food science, forestry, genetics, horticulture, marine biology, microbiology, mycology, nutrition, pesti-

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cides, physiology, poultry, soil science, veterinary medicine, virology, and zoology. Journals selected by subscribers' vote. 60 of the journals indexed are f r o m Britain and the British Commonwealth countries, 101 from the United States, 4 f r o m Europe, and 3 f r o m international organizations. 7 Translations of Russian journals are also included. Bulletins of state agricultural experiment stations, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and selected state agricultural extension bulletins were indexed from volume 1 to volume 18 (1916 to 1964). Certain foreign-language titles were dropped in 1949. Contents and arrangement. Similar to Readers' Guide to periodical literature and other H. W. Wilson indexes. Citations are listed by subject using Library of Congress subject headings and subheadings. Cross-references to other subjects are given when appropriate. N o author indexes. Each citation includes title of article, author, abbreviated title of journal, volume, pagination, and date, plus bibliography and translation notes, if significant. Book reviews are listed by author in a separate section in each issue. These may be useful for selection of current books. Critical comment. Widely used because of its selectivity and the arrangement of citations under specific subjects, which enables users to obtain references without having to refer laboriously between indexes and citation lists. Of particular value for those wanting a few important references quickly. Other sources, however, must be used for comprehensive searches and searches by author.

Biological membrane abstracts. V. 1- (1973-). London: Information Retrieval, 1973-. A046 Monthly. Covers publications on major aspects of m e m b r a n e structure and function surveyed over a wide range of biological systems. Includes plant as well as animal material. Monthly and cumulated author indexes.

Biology digest. V. 1- (1974-). Louisville, Ky.: Plexus, 1974-. A047 Monthly except June, July, and August. An abstracting service for life sciences literature "designed to assist students and educators at the secondary level and undergraduates in college in keeping current on latest scientific d e v e l o p m e n t s . " T h e abstracts are so lengthy as to be digests. Arranged by broad subject. Keyword and author indexes cumulated annually. Should also be useful for the advanced specialist who wants an overview of developments in fields other than his own.

Canadiana (1951-). Ottawa: National Library of Canada, Canadian Bibliographic Centre, 1951-. A048 Monthly. Title citations of publications of Canadian interest, including agriculture and science in general. Arranged by subject and author, with subject indexes each issue and annually, author indexes each issue and every three m o n t h s . Library loans available.

Commonwealth Agricultural Bureaux. Publications list. Agriculture, animal health, food science and technology, forestry, nutrition. Farnham Royal, Eng., 1975. 56 p. A049 Revised regularly. Descriptive list of the n u m e r o u s important abstracting, bibliographical, and review publications of CAB. Includes general information on how to order CAB publications, an alphabetical index of titles, recent and forthcoming titles, and addresses of C A B Institutes and Bureaux where research is d o n e and where the abstracts are prepared by specialists. Also includes information about publications issued by P U D O C (Centre for Agricultural Publishing and Documentation, Wageningen, T h e Netherlands). Many of the specific

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A046-A052

CAB publications are described in detail in the appropriate chapters of this book. C A B ' s automated data base (1023) is also described in Chapter I. Recent information about CAB information services is available in CAB news (started in 1977). See also " C o m m o n w e a l t h Agricultural Bureaux' world agricultural information service," by John Newton, in Special Libraries 69:250-254 (1978).

Current bibliographic directory of the arts & sciences (1967-). Philadelphia: Institute for Scientific Information, 1968-. A050 Annual. Title varies. Was Who is publishing in science (WPIS), 1971-1978. Scope increased in 1979 to include authors indexed in all of the ISI services which cover about 5,800 journals and 2,500 books each year. Gives abbreviated citations of each a u t h o r ' s publications for the year covered. Arranged in three parts: Author section, Geographic section, and Organization section. Useful as a directory of scientists and where they work as well as for a current listing of scholarly articles and books by author.

Current contents. Agriculture, biology & environmental sciences. V. 1- (1970-). Philadelphia: Institute for Scientific Information, 1970-. A051 Weekly. Title varies. Current-awareness service. Other titles in the series are: Current contents/Life sciences; Current contents/Social and behavioral sciences; Current contents/Clinical practice; Current contents/Engineering, technology