United Kingdom Butterfly Monitoring Scheme: collated indices 2020

Collated indices are a relative measure of butterfly abundance across sites monitored as part of the UK Butterfly Monitoring Scheme. Data from all survey sites (standard UKBMS transects, Wider Countryside Survey transects and targeted species surveys such as timed, larval web and egg counts) are used in the calculation of these indices. The statistics are presented as log10 values. These values are centred round an arbitrary value of 2 as a mean for the time series in order to help show which years are below or above average. Collated indices are calculated annually for each individual butterfly species that has been recorded on five or more sites in that year. Indices are calculated at UK level and at individual country level for England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland where sufficient data are available. Based on this criterion, collated indices have been calculated for the entire time series from 1976 (UK, England and Wales), 1979 (Scotland) and 2004 (Northern Ireland) to the current year for the majority of species, but for some rarer species this has not been possible in some years, particular those in the first part of the time series. Collated indices are calculated using a log-linear model incorporating individual site indices from all monitored sites across the UK or country for a given species in a given year. The number of sites for each species ranges from 5 to several hundred or more and fluctuates from year to year. By 2010 almost 2,000 sites were monitored in total across the UK, with this number rising to more than 3,000 over the next decade.

Collated indices are calculated so that we can determine how butterfly populations are changing over time across the UK. This data can be used, for example, to determine where to target conservation efforts and more generally the condition of the UK countryside. Butterflies are recognised as important indicators of biodiversity and environmental change, for example in UK and country Biodiversity Indicators, and have been used in numerous studies of the impacts of climate and habitat change on biodiversity.

The UK Butterfly Monitoring Scheme is organized and funded by Butterfly Conservation (BC), the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (UKCEH), the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO), and the Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC). The UKBMS is indebted to all volunteers who contribute data to the scheme.

This work was supported by the Natural Environment Research Council award number NE/R016429/1 as part of the UK-SCAPE programme delivering National Capability. Full details about this dataset can be found at https://doi.org/10.5285/f00fb86d-25c2-4f98-b882-c661511c93ac

Identification info

Metadata Language: English (en)

Character set: utf8

Dataset Reference Date (): 2022-02-04

Identifier: https://catalogue.ceh.ac.uk/id/f00fb86d-25c2-4f98-b882-c661511c93ac

Identifier: doi: / 10.5285/f00fb86d-25c2-4f98-b882-c661511c93ac

Other citation details: Botham, M.S., Middlebrook, I., Harris, S., Harrower, C., Lowe, M., Roy, D.B. (2022). United Kingdom Butterfly Monitoring Scheme: collated indices 2020. NERC EDS Environmental Information Data Centre 10.5285/f00fb86d-25c2-4f98-b882-c661511c93ac

UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology - Botham, M.S.

Butterfly Conservation - Middlebrook, I.

British Trust for Ornithology - Harris, S.

UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology - Harrower, C.

Butterfly Conservation - Lowe, M.

UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology - Roy, D.B.

UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology - Botham, M.S.

NERC EDS Environmental Information Data Centre

GEMET - INSPIRE themes, version 1.0 ()

Environmental Monitoring Facilities

Keywords

Biodiversity
England
Northern Ireland
Scotland
UK-SCAPE
United Kingdom
Wales

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Other constraints: This resource is available under the terms of the Open Government Licence

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Other constraints: © UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology

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Other constraints: © Butterfly Conservation

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Other constraints: © British Trust for Ornithology

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Other constraints: © Natural Environment Research Council

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Other constraints: © Joint Nature Conservation Committee

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Other constraints: Contains UK Butterfly Monitoring Scheme (UKBMS) data © copyright and database right Butterfly Conservation, the UK Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, British Trust for Ornithology, and the Joint Nature Conservation Committee.

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Other constraints: If you reuse this data, you should cite: Botham, M.S., Middlebrook, I., Harris, S., Harrower, C., Lowe, M., Roy, D.B. (2022). United Kingdom Butterfly Monitoring Scheme: collated indices 2020. NERC EDS Environmental Information Data Centre https://doi.org/10.5285/f00fb86d-25c2-4f98-b882-c661511c93ac

Spatial representation type: textTable

Topic category

Biota

Begin date: 1976-04-01

End date: 2020-09-30

Code: OSGB 1936 / British National Grid

Code: OSNI 1952 / Irish National Grid

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Dataset Reference Date (): 2010-12-08

Statement: Collated indices are produced using a series of statistical models on butterfly transect counts recorded by a volunteer network. These indices are a relative measure of each species' abundance across the UK compared to the baseline in 1976. The statistics are presented as log10 values. These values are centred around an arbitrary value of 2 as a mean for the time series in order to help show which years are below or above average (a technique used in other biodiversity indicators).

Metadata

File identifier: f00fb86d-25c2-4f98-b882-c661511c93ac XML

Metadata Language: English (en)

Character set: ISO/IEC 8859-1 (also known as Latin 1)

Resource type: dataset

Hierarchy level name: dataset

Metadata Date: 2022-12-01T10:48:41

Metadata standard name: UK GEMINI

Metadata standard version: 2.3

Environmental Information Data Centre

Lancaster Environment Centre, Library Avenue, Bailrigg , Lancaster , LA1 4AP , UK

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