Oversize Miss-shelving and British Plays

Recently I posted a blog about oversized books and their cranky ways and I thought I would provide an actual example of a couple I found yesterday to follow up:

• ff PZ8.3 .S848 CH 17 shelved at the end of the ff PQ's.
• ff PZ7 .T16123 AR 2006 shelved with the ff PN6737's.

Also, since I'm posting about miss-shelved items, I thought I would post one about a British play I found miss-shelved: 

• PR6063.C377 P550 2003 shelved as PR6023.C377 P550 2003.

Usually plays from this section usually end up in the PR6036, or oddly as a PR6045.  I think I might have found one shelved in the PR9000's too.

Happy Searching!

Over sized/Over folio as their own Collection

Recently whenever I receive a search for an over sized/over folio book or even while I'm searching the stacks for something completely different, I stumble upon in the over sized collection an over sized book that doesn't even belong on that floor.

It's always hard already because no one seems to know what the FF or F means in front of the call number or the difference between the two.  When I first began as the search coordinator, all I ever usually had to worry about in regard to the over sized/over folio collection was that they usually were miss-shelved in both sections (F meaning the books are so large or sometimes rare they need to lay on their sides and FF meaning the book is a bit bigger than the regular books and require larger shelving), or they sometimes ended up in with the regular books.  This miss-shelving of the FF's usually occur with the art and photography books because they have the most.

However, now it seems as if they are treated as their own collection spread among different floors.  I have found ff PQ's with the ff PR's and I even found an ff Z mixed with the ff C's.  Therefore, if you are ever searching for an over sized/over folio book, make sure you are looking at every book that is in the over sized and over folio on that floor, where it would be shelved with the "regular" sized books, and possibly with the over sized books on other floors too.

Happy Searching!

The "ff" at the beginning…

This weekend as I was searching for another book on the 9^th floor, I searched in the oversized collection (anything above 28 inches in dimension for our library) for that floor's call number range.  I found something rather odd, a ffN shelved at the very end for the collection, which is A, B, and C’s.

So I got to thinking about why there was an oversized N on the 9^th floor with the A,B,C’s and the only think I could think of was someone got confused by the ff at the beginning of the call number, or maybe they thought that all ff’s were shelved together.

Certainly a first for me!  Usually when ff’s go missing they are usually shelved as if they were a regular sized book (imagine all of the creative placements for attempting to put an oversized book on a teeny, tiny shelf!), or since people get confused with E’s and F’s too, they find themselves with the F’s as well as in the F’s ffs (say that 10 times fast!).

If you receive a request for an ff, not only should you look in the f’s (over-folio, the big, BIG stuff over 40 inches for our library) as well as the regular sized book as if the patron disregarded the ff, but also on every other floor in their ff section.  This may sound tedious, but you never know where ff books might pop up...or miss-shelved rather.

Happy Searching!