OpenHerbarium MCP is designed for a downstream agent such as Hermes Agent Botaniste. It is deliberately a knowledge-access layer only: it fetches, normalizes and cites botanical evidence, then lets the client agent reason, write, format and publish.

What this MCP does

It exposes MCP tools for:

plant lookup by common or scientific name;
taxonomic information;
species information such as distribution, habitat and botanical descriptions;
horticultural care-source discovery;
image-source discovery with licence and author metadata;
targeted botanical source search through a local Firecrawl instance when configured.

Every returned data point is wrapped with provenance:

{
  "value": "Marantaceae",
  "source": "GBIF Backbone Taxonomy",
  "url": "https://www.gbif.org/species/8184122",
  "retrieved_at": "2026-08-02T12:00:00+00:00",
  "confidence": "high"
}

What this MCP does not do

OpenHerbarium MCP never:

creates final Markdown plant sheets;
writes to Outline;
manages Outline collections;
creates care calendars;
decides final horticultural recommendations;
replaces the reasoning/presentation layer of Hermes Agent.

MCP tools

`search_plant(name: str)`

Returns:

accepted scientific name;
canonical name;
common/vernacular names when available;
synonyms;
family, genus, species and rank;
external identifiers such as GBIF keys and GBIF species URL;
best-effort Kew/POWO results when accessible.

`get_taxonomy(name: str)`

Returns sourced taxonomy:

kingdom;
phylum/class/order when available;
family;
genus;
species;
scientific name;
botanical authorship;
taxonomic status;
synonyms.

Priority sources:

GBIF Backbone Taxonomy;
Plants of the World Online, Kew, best-effort.

`get_species_information(name: str)`

Returns raw evidence for:

botanical descriptions;
known distribution;
natural habitat where available;
additional source-search records when Firecrawl is configured.

`get_care_sources(name: str)`

Returns raw source candidates for:

light;
temperature;
humidity;
watering;
substrate;
fertilisation;
repotting.

It does not transform those sources into final care advice.

`get_image_sources(name: str, limit: int = 10)`

Uses Wikimedia Commons to return:

image URL;
licence;
author;
source page.

`search_botanical_sources(query: str, limit: int = 5)`

Uses a local Firecrawl instance if FIRECRAWL_API_URL is configured. If not configured, the tool returns source-constrained suggested queries rather than pretending to have scraped content.

Sources

Implemented/targeted sources:

GBIF
Plants of the World Online, Kew best-effort connector
Wikimedia Commons
Royal Horticultural Society source candidates / Firecrawl search
Tela Botanica source candidates / Firecrawl search
public university horticultural resources via targeted Firecrawl search

No paid API is required.

Installation

Requirements

Python 3.11+
uv recommended, or any Python package installer capable of creating a virtual environment

Local install with `uv`

git clone https://git.home-deneuville.fr/Edern/openherbarium-mcp.git
cd openherbarium-mcp
uv sync --extra dev

Run tests:

uv run pytest

Run the MCP server over stdio:

uv run openherbarium-mcp

Hermes Agent configuration

Add the server to ~/.hermes/config.yaml:

mcp_servers:
  openherbarium:
    command: "uv"
    args:
      - "--directory"
      - "/absolute/path/to/openherbarium-mcp"
      - "run"
      - "openherbarium-mcp"
    timeout: 120
    connect_timeout: 60

Restart Hermes Agent. Tools will be exposed with names similar to:

mcp_openherbarium_search_plant
mcp_openherbarium_get_taxonomy
mcp_openherbarium_get_species_information
mcp_openherbarium_get_care_sources
mcp_openherbarium_get_image_sources
mcp_openherbarium_search_botanical_sources

Firecrawl configuration

Copy .env.example to .env and set:

FIRECRAWL_API_URL=http://localhost:3002
FIRECRAWL_API_KEY=

If Firecrawl is not configured, source-search tools return explicit suggested queries and a not_configured status.

Development

uv sync --extra dev
uv run pytest

Project layout:

openherbarium-mcp/
├── src/
│   └── openherbarium_mcp/
│       ├── server.py
│       ├── gbif.py
│       ├── kew.py
│       ├── rhs.py
│       ├── tela_botanica.py
│       ├── wikimedia.py
│       └── firecrawl.py
├── tests/
├── README.md
├── pyproject.toml
├── LICENSE
└── .env.example

Reliability model

The server distinguishes between:

high confidence: exact/high-confidence API matches, mostly GBIF taxonomic matches;
medium confidence: sourced API records that still require interpretation;
low confidence: source candidates or search results that must be manually/agent verified.

OpenHerbarium MCP prefers returning status: unavailable, status: not_configured or empty records over inventing missing data.

License

MIT

README.md

OpenHerbarium MCP