RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 A comparison between time-constrained counts and line transects as methods to estimate butterfly diversity and monitor populations in tropical habitats
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 2021.09.04.458959
DO 10.1101/2021.09.04.458959
A1 Attiwilli Suman
A1 Nitin Ravikanthachari
A1 Krushnamegh Kunte
YR 2021
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2021/12/25/2021.09.04.458959.abstract
AB Long-term species monitoring programmes have revealed catastrophic insect population declines and disruption of biological communities that are contributing to biodiversity loss. Such discoveries have been possible because of standardised methods, such as line transects, of counting butterflies and other insects. However, line transects are not feasible in many tropical and mountainous habitats, so alternative methods must be explored. To tackle this issue, we devised time-constrained (30-min) counts and compared butterfly diversity as estimated through this method with that estimated through line transects in three tropical habitats in India (evergreen forest, dry deciduous forest and an urban woodland). We tested the efficacy of the two methods to sample species richness and abundance, as well as numbers of rare, endemic and specialist butterflies. We observed greater species richness, and more species of habitat specialists and endemics per sample in time-constrained counts in evergreen forest, but not in the other two habitats. Thus, time-constrained counts were more efficient at detecting species in the species-rich evergreen habitat. Apart from this difference, the two sampling methods captured similar levels of species richness and other measures of diversity. Our study thus shows that time-constrained counts is a suitable if not a superior alternative to line transects to conduct butterfly diversity surveys and population monitoring in complex tropical landscapes. Due to methodological flexibility and simplicity, this method may be particularly useful to study the impacts of climate change, habitat fragmentation and land use practices on butterfly conservation in populous and tech-ready tropical countries using citizen science frameworks.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.