Background The dataset with 49,726 bryophytes occurrences (49,261 moss occurrences and 465 liverworts occurrences), located predominantly on the territory European north-east Russia, is described in this data paper. The dataset was based on the digitised moss labels from the Institute of Biology of Komi Scientific Сenter of the Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences herbarium (SYKO). The information

Background Anoplophora Hope, 1839 is a genus including more than 40 species occurring in Asia. Most species of this genus have beautiful colours on the elytra and are of great interest to insect collectors. Due to their developing in and consuming wood in the larval stage, species in this genus could be economically important, such as A. glabripennis, an introduced species to North America. New information

Background For residents of East-Southeast Asia’s megacities, interactions with “nature” may be largely limited to interactions taking place in urban parks. Urban parks provide refuges for ecologically-important biodiversity, such as insect pollinators. While residents may be unlikely to notice small insects, butterflies are more likely to be noticed and to provide positive human-“nature” interactions

Background The singing cicadas (Hemiptera: Cicadidae) of Bulgaria were poorly known. There are published records for 14 species: Cicada orni, Lyristes plebejus, Cicadatra atra, Cicadatra hyalina, Cicadatra persica, Cicadetta montana, Cicadetta mediterranea, Dimissalna dimissa, Oligoglena tibialis, Tympanistalna gastrica, Pagiphora annulata, Saticula coriaria, Tibicina haematodes and Tibicina steveni

Background In ichthyological publications from both Russia as a whole, and from the study region, lack of data indicating the actual results of observations in a specific place all result in publication of a generalised analysis. Although our publications contain such data, they are, however, not convenient for users performing global analysis. The main purpose of publishing a database is to make our

Background The Central Siberian Botanical Garden of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences (CSBG SB RAS) is the largest botanical institution in the Asian part of Russia. Founded in 1946, CSBG SB RAS is historically a consortium of two herbarium collections with their own acronyms (NS and NSK) and registration in the Index Herbariorum (Thiers 2020). At present the NS+NSK collections

Background Since the late 1980s, long-term monitoring of various components of natural ecosystems under conditions of industrial pollution has been carried out in the Central Urals. In the mid-2000s, similar programmes were started in the Southern Urals. As a part of these monitoring programmes, the data on invertebrates in different types of biotopes, collected with different methods and in a different

Background The sabellid genera Anamobaea Krøyer, 1856 and Notaulax Tauber, 1879 are two of the most attractive polychaete worms in coral reefs. Anamobaea is represented by two Caribbean species and Notaulax with 24 species from around the world, six of them previously known to tropical America. During examination of fouling biota and sclerozoans from Mexico, Anamobaea orstedii Krøyer, 1856 was found

Background Microsnails in the genus Diplommatina Benson, 1849 from eastern Thailand are revised, based on the collection of the Zoological Research Collection, Burapha University, Chonburi Province, Thailand and on recently-collected materials. New information Five new species, Diplommatina burapha sp. n., D. chadathongae sp. n., D. chantaburiensis sp. n., D. fusiformis sp. n. and D. khwantongae sp

Background The macroalgal flora of Graciosa (central group of Azores archipelago) is poorly known, with only 116 species recorded so far (authors personal data). The published information reflects occasional collections from sporadic field visits to the Island. To overcome this, a thorough investigation under the Expedition “GRACIOSA/2004”, the Campaigns “PADEL/2006”, “MACROBIOLMOL/2014” and “PIMA-BALA/2017”

Background As for many other Azorean Islands, the macroalgal flora of Terceira (belonging to the central group of the archipelago) is poorly known, the published information reflecting occasional collections of sporadic visitors to the island. In order to overcome this and contribute to improve the knowledge of Azorean macroalgal flora at both local and regional scales, a thorough investigation was

Background The oldest reference to marine life in Formigas Islets (oriental group of the Azores archipelago) goes back to the 16th century. Nevertheless, their macroalgal flora is poorly known, the published information mainly resulting from occasional collections of sporadic visitors. To overcome this and contribute to the knowledge of Azorean macroalgal flora at both local and regional scales, a

Background The seaweed flora of Pico Island (central group of the Azores archipelago) has attracted interest of researchers on past occasions. Despite this, the macroalgal flora of the island cannot be considered well-known as published information reflects only occasional collections. To overcome this, a thorough investigation encompassing collections and presence data recording was undertaken. Research

Earthworms contribute to the sustainability of food webs in the semi-natural grasslands of levees at paddy margins, which are typical components of satoyama, the traditional agricultural landscapes of Japan. Thus far, few studies have focused on earthworm fauna of paddy levees in satoyama. In this study, we investigated earthworm fauna and regional and monthly changes in earthworm density. We found

Background The intricate geomorphology of the coastline in the Chilean Channels and Fjords region, together with the freshwater inputs from the ice fields provide the area with very unique ecological characteristics and a variety of habitats that favour great marine biodiversity. However, although Chilean Patagonia has been the focus of several expeditions and ecological surveys, the greatest emphasis

Background Anteon is a speciose genus widespread in all zoogeographical regions, except Antarctica. New information A new species, Anteon hubeni sp. n., is described below from Ecuador, Pichincha Province. The new species is similar to Anteon oliveirai Olmi, known from Brazil, Minas Gerais. The main difference between these two species concerns the sculpture of the frons: in A. oliveirai, the frons

Background Hypomyces is a large genus of fungicolous fungi, parasitising the fruiting bodies of Agaricales, Boletales, Helotiales, Pezizales and Polyporales. Hypomyces currently comprises of 147 species widely distributed in Australia, China, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, North America, Sri Lanka, Thailand and UK. Amongst them, 28 species have been recorded in China. New information Hypomyces pseudolactifluorum

Background A spider taxonomy and ecology field course was organised in Kilpisjärvi Biological Station, northern Finland, in July 2019. During the course, four 50 × 50 m plots in mountain birch forest habitat were sampled following a standardised protocol. In addition to teaching and learning about spider identification, behaviour, ecology and sampling, the main aim of the course was to collect comparable

Background The Middle Eastern species of Eudorylas Aczél, 1940 are revised through an integrative taxonomic approach by combining morphological and sequence data from the mitochondrial COI barcoding gene. Four new species of the genus Eudorylas are described, males and females of three species are associated, DNA sequence data of 11 Middle Eastern Eudorylas species are provided and 15 additional species

Background Caucasian rock lizards of the genus is a unique taxa, including both bisexual and parthenogenetic species. The parthenogenetic species have originated as a result of natural hybridisation between females and males of different bisexual species. The species involved in interspecific hybridisation are called parental. However, sympatric zones (SZ) of unisexual and bisexual rock lizards of

Background Thyreophora cynophila (Panzer, 1798) is an iconic species of the European entomofauna. This winter-flying necrophagous fly was considered long extinct in Europe, before being discovered in Spain in 2010 and re-discovered in France in 2020, with a unique locality in Saint-Paul-de-Jarrat (Ariège, southern France). New information After bringing this species to the attention of people that

Background The islands and islets of Bahía de Chamela, in the Eastern Tropical Pacific, were declared as the first marine sanctuary in Mexico and has been protected since 2002. Their marine biodiversity has been documented in a series of papers in the last decade, but only three species of polychaete worms have been reported. New information Sixteen species of sedentary polychaete worms belonging to

One of the most valuable initiatives on massive availability of biodiversity data is the Global Biodiversity Information Facility, which is creating new opportunities to develop and test macroecological knowledge. However, the potential uses of these data are limited by the gaps and biases associated to large-scale distributional databases (the so-called Wallacean shortfall). Describing and quantifying

Background We introduce a new dataset of woody plants on 60 small tropical islands located in the Raja Ampat archipelago in Indonesia. The dataset includes incidence, abundance and functional trait data for 57 species. All islands were sampled using a standardised transect and plot design providing detailed information on plant occurrences at different spatial scales ranging from the local (plot and

Background The subfamily Gnoristinae is one of the most diverse and taxonomically difficult subfamilies of Mycetophilidae, with new species and genera being described almost every year from various parts of the world. Through inventories of fungus gnats in the Nordic Region and Russia, a genus and species new to science was discovered, yet with links back to an illustration made by the late French

Background In the past year, Prof. Jian Chen conducted several spider collections in Hubei Province. Almost 1000 spiders were collected. After diagnosis, two of them were found to belong to the genus Sinopoda Jäger, 1999. New information Two Sinopoda Jäger, 1999 species, both from Hubei Province, including one new species, are treated in the current paper: S. angulata Jäger, Gao & Fei, 2002 and S.

Background The deep-sea biome (> 200 m depth) is the world’s last great wilderness, covering more than 65% of the earth’s surface. Due to rapid technological advances, deep-sea environments are becoming more accessible to scientific research and ocean exploration around the world and, in recent years, this is also true for the Galapagos Islands. Deep-sea habitats cover the largest proportion of Galapagos

Background In this study, we introduce Corylicola gen. nov. in the family of Bambusicolaceae (Pleosporales), to accommodate Corylicola italica sp. nov. The new species was isolated from dead branches of Corylus avellana (common hazel) in Italy. The discovery of this new genus with both sexual and asexual characters will contribute to expand the knowledge and taxonomic framework of Bambusicolaceae.

The Mars Desert Research Station (MDRS) is a Mars-simulation campus set in a Martian planetary analogue in southern Utah. Despite a long history of astrobiology research, collections-based taxonomic inventories of the macro-level biodiversity around the station are relatively new. This study serves to add to the initial vascular plant list published for the station in 2016, where 39 species were recorded

One of the assets, assigned to the phytoplankton resting stages, is that of serving as the “memory” of the aquatic ecosystems and preserved biodiversity in the course of time. However, an accurate cyst identification proves to be a more difficult and extremely challenging process, even today. In order to gain a better taxonomic coverage of cyst assemblages in the Black Sea, an integrated approach of

Background The Mediterranean basin is known to be the cradle of many endemic species. Within mayflies (Insecta, Ephemeroptera), North African species belonging to the family Baetidae remain poorly known and, traditionally, affinities to European fauna were proposed. Recent studies, based on molecular reconstructions, showed closer relationships to Mediterranean islands fauna. New information Baetidae

The highly polyphagous and invasive brown marmorated stink bug, Halyomorpha halys (Stål) (Hemiptera: Pentatomidae), has become a significant insect pest in North America since its detection in 1996. It was first documented in northern Utah in 2012 and reports of urban nuisance problems and plant damage have since increased. Biological control is the preferred solution to managing H. halys in North

We present here an updated checklist for the butterflies of Matheran, Maharashtra, India, an eco-sensitive zone, with identification remarks for locally rare or very rare butterflies. This is the first dedicated checklist for butterflies of Matheran after 125 years. A total of 140 species of butterflies were recorded belonging to six families. Amongst them, 15 species were either listed under Schedule

The aim of our study was to characterise and compare the richness and composition of endemic, native (non-endemic) and introduced arthropod assemblages of two Azorean Historic Gardens with contrasting plant species composition. We hypothesised that Faial Botanic Garden would hold higher arthropod diversity and abundance of native and endemic arthropod species due to its larger native plant community

Background Wing venation is used as a tool in honeybee (Apis mellifera L., 1758) subspecies identification. The presented dataset concerns nineteen landmarks located at honeybee worker's forewing vein junctions. Landmarks of Apis mellifera caucasica Pollmann, 1889, A. mellifera carnica Pollmann, 1879 and A. mellifera mellifera Linnaeus, 1758, their hybrids and backcrosses were measured. In total, data

The invasive fan worm Branchiomma luctuosum (Grube, 1870), originally described from the Red Sea, is first reported here from the Albanian coasts, based on records held in Vlora Bay, a locality near to Valona harbour and Narta Lagoon. Possible pathways of arrival in the area are uncertain. However, species’ larval ecology and life-history traits suggest a secondary spreading through shipping. Social

After reviewing the published literature on sound production in insects, a standardised terminology and controlled vocabularies have been created. This combined terminology has potential for use in automated identification systems, evolutionary studies, and other use cases where the synthesis of bioacoustic traits from the literature is required. An example implementation has been developed for the

Background A survey has been carried out at four Israeli rocky sites to evaluate the diversity of the amphipod fauna on various hard substrates, still scarcely monitored, as potential pabulum for amphipod crustacean species. New information A survey of shallow rocky reefs along the Mediterranean coast of Israel recovered 28 species and integrated the Amphipoda checklist for the country ofIsrael with

This study summarises the diversity of living macroinvertebrates and seaweeds from the intertidal and subtidal rocky shores along Ecuadorian continental coast. Benthic macroinvertebrate communities and seaweeds were quantified over quadrants (50 × 50 cm) randomly placed on transects of 50 m length. A checklist of 612 species was generated: 479 species of macroinvertebrates and 133 species of seaweeds

Merlino Wood is a typical oak–hornbeam forest in the Po Plain hydrographic region. It is one of the few remaining lowland forests in Northern Italy and is a Regional Natural Reserve and a Site of Community Interest (code IT1160010). This is the first survey on hoverflies in the study area and they act as bioindicators to assess habitat conservation. Sampling was performed with three Malaise traps and

Background The giant pteromalid wasp Solenura ania (Walker) has a distinct sexual dimorphism. The metallic blue female is about 28 mm long and the metallic green male is only about 6 mm in length. This species is an ectoparasitoid of some woodborers, such as Trichoferus campestris (Faldermann), a pest of many live trees and wood furniture and a quarantine pest in many countries. However, the male of

Background The use of DNA barcoding allows unprecedented advances in biodiversity assessments and monitoring schemes of freshwater ecosystems; nevertheless, it requires the construction of comprehensive reference collections of DNA sequences that represent the existing biodiversity. Plecoptera are considered particularly good ecological indicators and one of the most endangered groups of insects, but

Background The advent and boom of DNA barcoding technologies have provided a powerful tool for the fields of ecology and systematics. Here, we present the InBIO Barcoding Initiative Database: Portuguese Bats (Chiroptera) dataset containing DNA sequences of 63 specimens representing the 25 bat species currently known for continental Portugal. For that, we sequenced tissues samples obtained in a vast

The family Acanthuridae is a key component of coral reef ecosystems as it controls macroalgae biomass buildup. During routine monitoring of benthic communities in the Mexican Caribbean, we observed unusual behaviour of a group of Acanthurus chirurgus, which were feeding on a tuna head left on site by travel tour personnel. This phenomenon has been documented in other herbivorous fish species, especially

Background The Florida Keys Mosquito Control District has used dry ice-baited light traps to monitor mosquito populations on Vaca Key since 1998. The first site sampled was monitored continuously for almost 20 years until all vegetation was removed. New information This paper describes a dataset compiled over almost 20 years of continuous trapping along Manor Lane on Vaca Key, Florida.

Background Cerambycidae is one the most diverse families in the order Coleoptera with more than 37,000 species described in all continents. Cerambicyd beetles have a worldwide distribution from sea level to montane sites. In Mexico, more than 1,600 species have been recorded. Nevertheless, the diversity and distribution of this family in the Mexican deserts is poorly known. New information A first

Background Iguaçu National Park (INP) is known worldwide due to Iguaçu Waterfalls, being considered a World Natural Heritage by UNESCO. The INP is one of the last large forested extensions of inland Brazil that provides protection to the Atlantic Forest, one of the world’s biodiversity hotspots. However, its Natural Heritage status has been threatened by the construction and operation of the Baixo

Background Permafrost, frozen ground cemented with ice, occupies about a quarter of the Earth’s hard surface and reaches up to 1000 metres depth. Due to constant subzero temperatures, permafrost represents a unique record of past epochs, whenever it comes to accumulated methane, oxygen isotope ratio or stored mummies of animals. Permafrost is also a unique environment where cryptobiotic stages of different

Background Mycological research in the Northern part of West Siberia has now become sufficient for review and digitisation as over 460 scientific works have been completed mainly since the beginning of the 20th century. The history of research in the region started from isolated studies at the beginning of the 20th century, but regular and systematic research started from the 1970s. Over the following

Background The golden-headed weevil Compsus auricephalus is a native and fairly widespread species across the southern U.S.A. extending through Central America south to Panama. There are two recognised morphotypes of the species: the typical green form, with pink to cupreous head and part of the legs and the uniformly white to pale brown form. There are other Central and South American species of Compsus

Background Springtails (Arthropoda, Hexapoda, Collembola) are small arthropods commonly found in soil, litter and other habitats all around the Globe. More than 9,000 species have been described worldwide, but knowledge about their diversity and distribution remains far from complete. Reports of springtail diversity in the Antilles are uneven, some islands are relatively well known, whereas others

Background Aquatic hyphomycetes are a phylogenetically heterogeneous group of fungi living preferentially in fast flowing, well-aerated forest streams. These fungi have worldwide distribution, but with the exception of Articulospora tetracladia, no aquatic hyphomycete taxon was previously recorded on Madeira Island. Aquatic hyphomycetes were sampled from 40 sites, distributed by 27 permanent streams

The New Zealand fauna of snout moths (Pyraloidea) predominantly consists of endemic species. During 2017 and 2018, 56 species of Pyraloidea in 1,749 individuals were collected at 14 localities. All species were screened for Wolbachia-infection, with specimens of eight species (14%) being positive, of which six species belong to Scopariinae. This is the first record of Wolbachia-infection amongst New

Background The process of ecosystem development over time that takes place on a new substrate devoid of biological activity (such as, for example, lava) is called primary succession. Research on primary succession is not easy, as it is limited to rare occasions when a piece of land totally lacking in any pre-existing life occurs. The emergence of volcanic islands is such an occasion; it is a unique

Background The W National Park and its two hunting zones represent a unique ecosystem in Burkina Faso for biodiversity conservation. This study aims at providing a detailed view of the current state of the floristic diversity as a baseline for future projects aiming at protecting and managing its resources. We combined intensive inventories and distribution records from vegetation plots, photo records

The genus Stylogaster Macquart (Diptera: Conopidae) is sister to the remainder of the Conopidae. While all other Conopidae are endoparasitoids of aculeate Hymenoptera, species of Stylogaster appear to be endoparasitoids of ‘orthopteroids’, as the only confirmed rearing records are from crickets and cockroaches. Many calyptrate flies have been observed with Stylogaster eggs attached, but since no Stylogaster

Background Biogeographical units are widely adopted in ecological research and nature conservation management, even though biogeographical regionalisation is still under scientific debate. The European Environment Agency provided an official map of the European Biogeographical Regions (EBRs), which contains the official boundaries used in the Habitats and Birds Directives. However, these boundaries

Background An up-to-date checklist of the Peninsular Malaysian marine Anthuroidea is presented, based on previous taxonomic or ecological literature and recent collections. The present study, a part of the subproject on the Biodiversity of Sultan Iskandar Marine Park, recognised 24 species in 12 genera and 5 families from Peninsular Malaysia. An extensive list of bibliographical references, detailed

Background China is one of the countries with the greatest species diversity of Chilocorini (Coleoptera: Coccinellidae), including nearly forty-five percent of the known genera and fourteen percent of all described species in this tribe. Recently, we discovered three species previously not recorded in China. New information In this study, three species Priscibrumus uropygialis (Mulsant, 1853), Priscibrumus

Biological collections are central in understanding and preserving life on Earth. In Brazil, the most representative collections are kept by natural history museums, whose primary focus is in invertebrates, vertebrates and vascular plants. Only a few institutions keep repositories in different kingdoms. The Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz), established in 1900, is a strategic public health institution