FBIP: DNA barcode reference library for plants from Addo Elephant National Park for herbivore diet studies

Identifying their diet resources is key to understanding how a high diversity of herbivore species can co-exist without competition, as well as in terms of predicting their impacts on plant species and communities. To date describing the diets of herbivores has been slow, cumbersome and probably biased. The use of DNA metabarcoding of diet samples however overcomes these limits, but is dependent on the availability of a comprehensive reference collection of DNA sequenced material for the potentially consumed plant species. To date no such reference collection exists for Subtropical Thicket in the Eastern Cape. This project therefore aimed to establish such a reference collection, for the plant community in the Addo Elephant National Park (AENP). The data set represents the plant voucher specimens collected from two localities, their identities, and DNA sequences. The voucher specimens have been deposited in the Ria Olivier Herbarium at NMMU.