Photo‐sharing platforms key for characterising niche and distribution in poorly studied taxa

The continuing advancement of new technologies is making available novel sources of occurrence data, such as photo‐sharing platforms. Using three Iberian Argiope spider species as models, this study aimed to compare the quality of three data sources – existing scientific literature, a biodiversity‐f...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Insect conservation and diversity 2019-09, Vol.12 (5), p.389-403
Main Authors: Jiménez‐Valverde, Alberto, Peña‐Aguilera, Pablo, Barve, Vijay, Burguillo‐Madrid, Lidia, Leather, Simon, Stewart, Alan
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Argiope
bias
Biodiversidad virtual
Biodiversity
climatic niche
Flickr
New records
Niches
occurrence data
photo records
Protected areas
scientific literature
social media
Social organization
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Summary:The continuing advancement of new technologies is making available novel sources of occurrence data, such as photo‐sharing platforms. Using three Iberian Argiope spider species as models, this study aimed to compare the quality of three data sources – existing scientific literature, a biodiversity‐focused photo‐sharing citizen science project, and a photo‐sharing social network – and the results derived from niche and distribution analyses. Data sources were compared in terms of sample size, spatial clustering, and coverage, degree of climatic niche completeness, and in their consistency in the characterisation of response curves. Possible biases towards big cities and protected natural areas were identified, and species distribution models were parameterised and compared. Photo records provided the largest number of occurrences, whereas data from scientific literature showed the worst spatial coverage. Records from the citizen science project yielded the highest degree of niche completeness. All data sources showed some bias towards big cities and protected areas. Data from existing scientific literature yielded the worst range representations and, accordingly, the most different distribution models, whereas the models based on two photo‐vouchered sources were very similar. Range and niche analyses using records from different sources may yield disparate results. Occurrence data from existing scientific literature may not be enough to develop robust niche analyses nor to characterise recent range changes of poorly studied taxa. Photo‐sharing platforms provide updated chorological information and have the potential to increase sample sizes dramatically, which is an important data property in distribution and niche modelling. There is a need to gather records from different sources when doing ecological analyses and distribution modelling in order to compile the most complete occurrence database. The continuing advancement of new technologies is making available novel sources of occurrence data, such as photo‐sharing platforms, which can provide a substantial increase in sample size. In the case of poorly studied taxa that can accurately be identified through an image, photo records may be a necessary complement to traditional data sources like scientific literature.
ISSN:1752-458X
1752-4598
DOI:10.1111/icad.12351