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Am Beispiel der wenig mobilen und damit als Indikatoren sehr gut geeigneten Mollusken werden die Erfassungsmethode, die Aufbereitung der Proben sowie die Methodenprobleme und Validierungsmöglichkeiten dieses Indikators für den Artenreichtum in Lebensräumen des Biodiversitäts-Monitoring Schweiz (BDM) vorgestellt. Während der ersten Erhebungsphase (2001 -2005) wurden auf einem vordefinierten Raster 1 529 Beprobungen durchgeführt. Insgesamt wurden 67107 Mollusken-Individuen erfasst, von diesen konnten 62 987 Individuen 150 Art(komplex)en zugeordnet werden, der Rest der Schalen war nur fragmentarisch erhalten. Im ersten Erhebungsdurchgang wurden somit 54,8 % der 274 in der Schweiz vorkommenden Molluskenarten nachgewiesen. Dichten, Gesamtindividuenzahlen und Konstanz der wichtigsten Arten werden kurz dargestellt. Anhand zweier Karten wird der aktuelle Kenntnisstand zum regionalen Artenreichtum demonstriert. Es lassen sich deutliche Unterschiede in der Molluskendiversität der naturräumlichen Einheiten erkennen, die bezüglich der Bedeutung für den Erhalt der Artenvielfalt diskutiert werden. Im Rahmen des BDM wurde für zahlreiche Arten die Kenntnis der Höhenverbreitung erweitert. So lassen sich in Zukunft Aussagen zur Auswirkung von Klimaänderungen treffen, wobei Verschiebungen in der Höhenzonierung zu erwarten sind.

Kobialka, H., Plattner, M., & Rüetschi, J. (2010). Das Biodiversitätsmonitoring der Schweiz. Methoden und Ergebnisse am Beispiel der Mollusken. Natur und Landschaft 85/4:142-148.

The objective of this study was to compare butterfly abundances and diversity between wildflower strips and extensively used meadows to identify which butterfly species can be supported by establishing wildflower strips. Butterflies were recorded along transects during one season in twenty-five sown wildflower strips and eleven extensively used meadows in a Swiss lowland agricultural landscape (600 ha). In total 1,669 butterflies of 25 species were observed (25 in the strips, 18 in meadows). This can be related to 38 species recorded in the region (lowland part of Kanton Fribourg) within the Swiss Biodiversity Monitoring Programme. In wildflower strips the number of butterflies per transect meter was significantly higher than in the meadows, but there was no significant difference in species richness. Butterfly communities, though, were quite different between the two habitat types. Habitat type, abundances of flowering plants and presence of forest within 50 m were identified as factors influencing butterfly species richness. Butterfly abundances were affected by habitat type and abundance of flowering plants. In wildflower strips, 65% of all flower visits by butterflies were observed on Origanum. It can be concluded that sown wildflower strips can support a substantial part of a regions species pool. This is mostly true for common species, but can apply to rare species when, for example, larval food plant requirements are met.

Haaland, C., & Bersier, L.-F. (2011). What can sown wildflower strips contribute to butterfly conservation?: An example from a Swiss lowland agricultural landscape. Journal of Insect Conservation, 15(1–2), 301–309. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10841-010-9353-8

We present a new indicator taxa approach to the prediction of climate change effects on biodiversity at the national level in Switzerland. As indicators, we select a set of the most widely distributed species that account for 95% of geographical variation in sampled species richness of birds, butterflies, and vascular plants. Species data come from a national program designed to monitor spatial and temporal trends in species richness. We examine some opportunities and limitations in using these data. We develop ecological niche models for the species as functions of both climate and land cover variables. We project these models to the future using climate predictions that correspond to two IPCC 3rd assessment scenarios for the development of ‘greenhouse’ gas emissions. We find that models that are calibrated with Swiss national monitoring data perform well in 10-fold cross-validation, but can fail to capture the hot-dry end of environmental gradients that constrain some species distributions. Models for indicator species in all three higher taxa predict that climate change will result in turnover in species composition even where there is little net change in predicted species richness. Indicator species from high elevations lose most areas of suitable climate even under the relatively mild B2 scenario. We project some areas to increase in the number of species for which climate conditions are suitable early in the current century, but these areas become less suitable for a majority of species by the end of the century. Selection of indicator species based on rank prevalence results in a set of models that predict observed species richness better than a similar set of species selected based on high rank of model AUC values. An indicator species approach based on selected species that are relatively common may facilitate the use of national monitoring data for predicting climate change effects on the distribution of biodiversity.

Pearman, P. B., Guisan, A., & Zimmermann, N. E. (2011). Impacts of climate change on Swiss biodiversity: An indicator taxa approach. Biological Conservation, 144(2), 866–875. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2010.11.020

The Global Index of Vegetation-Plot Databases (GIVD) is a metadatabase of vegetation databases worldwide that was initiated by an international Steering Committee in 2010 and that is hosted on a server in Greifswald. GIVD aims at providing a better overview on the growing number of vegetationplot databases and increasing their accessibility for overarching analyses. In this article, we analyse which data from central Europe (including the Benelux countries) are available in GIVD. On 20 March 2011, 1.35 million of the total 2.45 million registered relevés originated from one of the covered twelve countries. With more than 600,000 digitally available relevés, corresponding to a density of 18 km–2 , the Netherlands are globally leading in this respect.

Jansen, F., Dengler, J., Glöckler, F., Chytry, M., Ewald, J., Oldeland, J., & Schaminée, J.H.J. (2011). Die mitteleuropäischen Datenbanken im Global Index of Vegetation-Plot Databases (GIVD). Tuexenia 31: 351-367.