Israeli Butterfly Monitoring Scheme (BMS-IL)

Data Records

The data in this sampling event resource has been published as a Darwin Core Archive (DwC-A), which is a standardized format for sharing biodiversity data as a set of one or more data tables. The core data table contains 7,329 records.

2 extension data tables also exist. An extension record supplies extra information about a core record. The number of records in each extension data table is illustrated below.

This IPT archives the data and thus serves as the data repository. The data and resource metadata are available for download in the downloads section. The versions table lists other versions of the resource that have been made publicly available and allows tracking changes made to the resource over time.

Versions

The table below shows only published versions of the resource that are publicly accessible.

How to cite

Researchers should cite this work as follows:

Peer I (2014): Israeli Butterfly Monitoring Scheme (BMS-IL). v6.17. ILS - Israeli Lepidopterists’ society. Dataset/Samplingevent. http://cloud.gbif.org/eubon/resource?r=butterflies-monitoring-scheme-il&v=6.17

Rights

Researchers should respect the following rights statement:

The publisher and rights holder of this work is ILS - Israeli Lepidopterists’ society. To the extent possible under law, the publisher has waived all rights to these data and has dedicated them to the Public Domain (CC0 1.0). Users may copy, modify, distribute and use the work, including for commercial purposes, without restriction.

GBIF Registration

This resource has been registered with GBIF, and assigned the following GBIF UUID: 647ae6f8-8e26-4189-b448-02b45b7ad884.  ILS - Israeli Lepidopterists’ society publishes this resource, and is itself registered in GBIF as a data publisher endorsed by GBIF Israel.

Keywords

samplingevent; Other; Occurrence; butterflies; Lepidoptera; Israel; Systematic monitoring

Contacts

Geographic Coverage

Israel Borders

Taxonomic Coverage

Butterflies

Temporal Coverage

Project Data

Israeli Butterfly systematic Monitoring Scheme

The personnel involved in the project:

Sampling Methods

Transects are divided into 50m sections and range between 300m and 600m in total length. A transect usually covers a single habitat type. The observer counts the number of every butterfly species that can be seen within a 5m range for each section within the transect. As in all other systematic Butterfly Monitoring Schemes (BMS), the entire transect must always be walked (partial transect walks are not recorded). Furthermore, when no butterfly species are seen for the entire transect, the absence event is still recorded using “-s00” standard notation. Special behaviours such as egg laying or drinking nectar as well as butterfly larvae or eggs can be recorded as well.

Method step description:

1. Selection of location and route of transect is verified by a scientific/principal investigator.
2. On the first visit to a new transect, the observer is guided by an expert along the transect. Note each section is numbered and marked.
3. Start time and weather conditions are recorded first.
4. During transect walk, the observer walks the entire transect and for each section records the count of every butterfly species that can be seen within a 5x5x5m imaginary cube (i.e., within a range of 2.5 m to the sides and 5 m front and above).
5. To avoid errors in abundance calculations, individuals that cannot be identified to the species level are registered either by family or as a predefined complex of two or three similar species.
6. Butterflies seen outside of the 5m range can be recorded by the observer as ‘Extra’ alongside the code of the nearest section (e.g. 5-extra). However, these extra observations are regarded as sporadic data and are never included in the total number of butterflies observed within the controlled transect area.
7. Time ends is recorded.
8. If no butterflies are seen for the entire transect, the observer types "non seen" to ensure that the absence event is still registered. Note this is important later on when modelling butterfly flight curves and abundances taking into consideration all observations events.
9. Observer logs in to the server and types in the data. Absence events are recorded using “-s00” – standard notation.
10. Data is ready for verification by the expert.

Bibliographic Citations

1. For more information on Israel's butterflies, see Benyamini, D. (2002) A Field Guide to the Butterflies of Israel, Including of Mt. Hermon, Sinai and Jordan (Revised edition). Keter Publishing House, Jerusalem (in Hebrew. Maps and activity periods are illustrated visually).
2. For effective data analysis, see: Dennis, E. B., Freeman, S. N., Brereton, T., Roy, D. B. (2013), Indexing butterfly abundance whilst accounting for missing counts and variability in seasonal pattern. Methods in Ecology and Evolution, 4: 637–645. doi: 10.1111/2041-210X.12053 https://dx.doi.org/10.1111/2041-210X.12053
3. Schmucki, R., G. Pe'er, D. B. Roy, C. Stefanescu, C. Van Swaay, T. H. Oliver, M. Kuusaari, A. Van Strien, L. Ries, J. Settele, M. Musche, J. Carnicer, O. Schweiger, T. Brereton, A. Harpke, J. Heliölä, E. Kühn, and R. Julliard (2015) Regionally informed abundance index for supporting integrative analyses across butterfly monitoring schemes. Journal of Applied Ecology, online first. doi: 10.1111/1365-2664.12561 https://dx.doi.org/10.1111/1365-2664.12561
4. For guidelines on systematic butterfly monitoring see Van Swaay, C., Regan, E., Ling, M., Bozhinovska, E., Fernandez, M., Marini-Filho, O.J., Huertas, B., Phon, C.-K., K”orösi, A., Meerman, J., Pe’er, G., Uehara-Prado, M., Sáfián, S., Sam, L., Shuey, J., Taron, D., Terblanche, R., and Underhill, L. (2015). Guidelines for Standardised Global Butterfly Monitoring. Group on Earth Observations Biodiversity Observation Network, Leipzig, Germany. GEO BON Technical Series 1, 32pp. http://www.geobon.org/Downloads/reports/GEOBON/2015/Global%20Butterfly%20Monitoring_Web.pdf

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