Cook Patrick M, Tordoff George M, Davis Tony M, Parsons Mark S, Dennis Emily B, Fox Richard, Botham Marc S, Bourn Nigel A D
Butterfly Conservation, Wareham, UK.
Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, Wallingford, UK.
Ecology. 2022 May;103(5):e3670. doi: 10.1002/ecy.3670. Epub 2022 Apr 5.
Butterflies and moths, collectively Lepidoptera, are integral components of ecosystems, providing key services such as pollination and a prey resource for vertebrate and invertebrate predators. Lepidoptera are a relatively well studied group of invertebrates. In Great Britain and Ireland numerous citizen science projects provide data on changes in distribution and abundance. The availability of high-quality monitoring and recording data, combined with the rapid response of Lepidoptera to environmental change, makes them ideal candidates for traits-based ecological studies. Recently, there has been an increase in the number of studies documenting traits-based responses of Lepidoptera, highlighting the demand for a standardized and referenced traits database. There is a wide range of primary and secondary literature sources available regarding the ecology of British and Irish Lepidoptera to support such studies. Currently these sources have not been collated into one central repository that would facilitate and enhance future research. Here, we present a comprehensive traits database for the butterflies and macro-moths of Great Britain and Ireland. The database covers 968 species in 21 families. Ecological traits fall into four main categories: life cycle ecology and phenology, host plant specificity and characteristics, breeding habitat, and morphological characteristics. The database also contains data regarding species distribution, conservation status, and temporal trends for abundance and occupancy. This database can be used for a wide array of purposes including further fundamental research on species and community responses to environmental change, conservation and management studies, and evolutionary biology. There are no copyright restrictions, and this paper must be cited if data are used in publications.
蝴蝶和飞蛾统称为鳞翅目昆虫，是生态系统的重要组成部分，提供诸如授粉等关键服务，并为脊椎动物和无脊椎动物捕食者提供猎物资源。鳞翅目昆虫是一类研究相对充分的无脊椎动物。在英国和爱尔兰，众多公民科学项目提供了有关分布和数量变化的数据。高质量的监测和记录数据的可得性，再加上鳞翅目昆虫对环境变化的快速反应，使其成为基于性状的生态学研究的理想对象。最近，记录鳞翅目昆虫基于性状反应的研究数量有所增加，凸显了对标准化和有参考文献的性状数据库的需求。有大量关于英国和爱尔兰鳞翅目昆虫生态学的一级和二级文献来源可支持此类研究。目前，这些来源尚未整理到一个中央存储库中，而这将有助于并加强未来的研究。在此，我们展示了一个涵盖英国和爱尔兰蝴蝶及大型蛾类的综合性状数据库。该数据库涵盖了21个科的968个物种。生态性状主要分为四类：生命周期生态学和物候学、寄主植物特异性和特征、繁殖栖息地以及形态特征。该数据库还包含有关物种分布、保护状况以及数量和占有率的时间趋势的数据。这个数据库可用于多种目的，包括对物种和群落对环境变化的反应进行进一步的基础研究、保护和管理研究以及进化生物学研究。不存在版权限制，且如果在出版物中使用了这些数据，必须引用本文。
