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butterfly databases in the world , with important implications for the study of global change, will “go public” on March 1. Since 1972, Dr. Arthur Shapiro of the Center for Population Biology and Section of Evolution and Ecology, College of Biological Sciences, University of California – Davis, has maintained a butterfly-monitoring transect across northern California parallel to Interstate Highway 80. The transect grew from four sites in 1972-74 to 10 in 1988. The sites range from sea level to tree-line in the Sierra Nevada (above 9000’) and embrace both the west- and east-slope Sierran climates. At each site data are collected every two weeks during butterfly season, which ranges from all year at sea level to about three months at the highest site. As of the end of 2006, Dr. Shapiro has logged 5476 site visits with approximately 83,000 individual records of 159 species and subspecies. This is believed to be the world’s largest dataset of intensive site-specific data on butterfly distribution and seasonality collected by a single individual under a strict protocol. The other large butterfly database, the United Kingdom Butterfly Monitoring Scheme, is quite differently organized, employing many volunteer observers throughout the country who monitor their local faunas at 1228 sites. The British fauna is much smaller, with fewer than 60 species in total, and with less topographic relief and climatic diversity in the entire country than occurs on the California transect. Butterflies have become very prominent indicator organisms in conservation and global-change biology. Both projects present unique opportunities to observe and quantify the responses of these animals to changing climatic conditions. Many species in Britain are near their northern range limits, making the British data good indicators of climatic sensitivity. Because California’s Mediterranean climate is so variable, Shapiro believes his data may be particularly useful in identifying the relative contributions of different climatic factors to butterfly seasonality and distribution. With support from the U.S. National Science Foundation, we have created a Web site, <http://butterfly.ucdavis.edu/>http://butterfly.ucdavis.edu, which incorporates all of the California transect data as well as climatological data for nearby weather stations (from the Western Regional Climate Center), capsule ecological, geological and climatic descriptions (with maps) of all of the sites, biological summaries for all the species recorded in the study, and numerous photographs of the sites and the butterflies. For each species, its year-by-year seasonal history is presented for each site, along with a smoothed graph representing the probability of seeing it each week of the year. The site provides links to numerous related butterfly resources, profiles of the members of the project, a partial bibliography and a glossary of terms. All of this material is directly accessible to the public. Researchers interested in obtaining access to the complete data set, as well as anyone with butterfly questions, is invited to email us using the Web site’s “Contact us” function. The site should be of interest to the general public and to both professional and amateur butterfly enthusiasts, as well as ecologists, evolutionary biologists, conservation biologists and global-change specialists. Although the site provides life-history information for all the species, this information is specifically focused on the study sites and their vicinity and should not be used as a substitute for more comprehensive sites or field guides. In addition , we provide a series of exercises (some still in development) to allow high-school teachers to use the database to teach and illustrate concepts in quantitative biology, statistics, field biology and natural history. The Shapiro lab group is currently engaged in a variety of projects employing these data. More information is available on request. CONTACT INFORMATION: Arthur M. Shapiro, Center for Population Biology, UC Davis: <mailto:amshapiro@ucdavis.edu>amshapiro@ucdavis.edu, (530)752-2176, FAX (530)752-1449.
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