Description
Meetnetten.be - Bat winter roosts counts (per individual) Flanders, Belgium is a sampling event dataset published by the Research Institute of Nature and Forest (INBO). It is part of the Meetnetten.be suite of monitoring networks for priority species in Flanders, in which data are collected at fixed locations using a standardized protocol (https://meetnetten.be). This dataset contains detailed winter roosts count data of individual bats. Here it is published as a standardized Darwin Core Archive and includes for each sampling event an eventID, date, location and sampling protocol (in the event core), and for each occurrence an occurrenceID, the number of recorded individuals, status (present/absent), scientific name and taxon rank (in the occurrence extension). Issues with the dataset can be reported at https://github.com/inbo/meetnetten-occurrences/issues
Generalized and/or withheld information: as this dataset includes sensitive priority species, location information is generalized for all bat species to 5 or 10 km Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) grid cells. Original locations are available upon request.
We have released this dataset to the public domain under a Creative Commons Zero waiver. We would appreciate it if you follow the INBO norms for data use (https://www.inbo.be/en/norms-data-use) when using the data. If you have any questions regarding this dataset, don't hesitate to contact us via the contact information provided in the metadata or via opendata@inbo.be.
For all published Meetnetten.be datasets, see https://www.gbif.org/dataset/search?project_id=meetnetten.be
Data Records
The data in this sampling event resource has been published as a Darwin Core Archive (DwC-A), which is a standardized format for sharing biodiversity data as a set of one or more data tables. The core data table contains 23,572 records.
1 extension data tables also exist. An extension record supplies extra information about a core record. The number of records in each extension data table is illustrated below.
This IPT archives the data and thus serves as the data repository. The data and resource metadata are available for download in the downloads section. The versions table lists other versions of the resource that have been made publicly available and allows tracking changes made to the resource over time.
Versions
The table below shows only published versions of the resource that are publicly accessible.
How to cite
Researchers should cite this work as follows:
Piesschaert F, De Bruyn L, Gyselings R, Dekeukeleire D, Cooleman S, Brosens D, Westra T, Desmet P, Ruyts S, Lefevre A, Vandendriessche B, Boers K, Vermeiren H, Palmans G, Roels E, Pollet M (2025). Meetnetten.be - Bat winter roosts counts (per individual) Flanders, Belgium. Version 1.0. Research Institute for Nature and Forest (INBO). Samplingevent dataset. https://ipt.inbo.be/resource?r=meetnetten-vleermuizen-wintertelling-individu-occurrences&v=1.0
Rights
Researchers should respect the following rights statement:
The publisher and rights holder of this work is Research Institute for Nature and Forest (INBO). To the extent possible under law, the publisher has waived all rights to these data and has dedicated them to the Public Domain (CC0 1.0). Users may copy, modify, distribute and use the work, including for commercial purposes, without restriction.
GBIF Registration
This resource has been registered with GBIF, and assigned the following GBIF UUID: 4a09406b-98db-4c88-8f4f-feca075326a7. Research Institute for Nature and Forest (INBO) publishes this resource, and is itself registered in GBIF as a data publisher endorsed by Belgian Biodiversity Platform.
Keywords
Samplingevent; Observation; bats; monitoring; priority species; Flanders
Contacts
- Originator ●
- Point Of Contact
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5843-646X
- Originator
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- Metadata Provider ●
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- Metadata Provider ●
- Originator
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Geographic Coverage
Flanders, Belgium
| Bounding Coordinates | South West [50.67, 2.53], North East [51.51, 5.94] |
|---|
Taxonomic Coverage
All bats are in the target scope of these winter roosts counts in Meetnetten.be, as listed at https://meetnetten.be/projects/79/. Other animals observed during these count events are also included, typically as casual observations of accompanying species.
| Kingdom | Animalia |
|---|---|
| Class | Mammalia |
| Order | Chiroptera |
Temporal Coverage
| Start Date / End Date | 1992-02-01 / 2024-12-31 |
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Project Data
Meetnetten.be is a suite of monitoring networks through which the Flemish Government is collecting high-quality information on 65 priority plant and animal species. These are species on which Flanders has to report to Europe in the framework of the Habitats and Birds Directives, but also other species that are important for the Flemish nature policy.
| Title | Meetnetten.be |
|---|---|
| Identifier | meetnetten.be |
| Funding | Flemish Government |
| Study Area Description | Flanders, Belgium |
| Design Description | Each monitoring network consists of fixed sample locations in which target species are counted based on a standardized protocol. Data collection relies mainly on specialized volunteers, coordinated by the NGO Natuurpunt Studie. Fieldwork is planned and monitored with the web tool https://meetnetten.be, which is also used for entering the collected data. |
The personnel involved in the project:
Sampling Methods
Detailed counts of winter roosts (within counting sites) in where bats are registered per sublocation (room or section) and per individual. This protocol is typically used for larger sites (old fortresses, mines) with sublocations (multiple rooms or sections). Information is noted per individual, such as: species, subsite hanging behaviour (in crevice, in tube, free hanging, at the wall, in an artificial object at the wall, or in an artificial object at the ceiling) and cluster size.
| Study Extent | Located throughout Flanders, bats are counted at hibernation sites during winter. |
|---|---|
| Quality Control | Data are collected using predefined sampling protocol. |
Method step description:
- Researchers from INBO and Natuurpunt Studie define and document the appropriate sampling protocol for the target species.
- Fieldwork is planned and coordinated by Natuurpunt Studie, using https://meetnetten.be.
- Data are collected in the field by specialized volunteers, using the predefined sampling protocol.
- Volunteers enter the collected data in https://meetnetten.be.
- A custom SQL view is created in the meetnetten.be database to map the original data to Darwin Core as an event core and occurrence extension.
- The Darwin Core views are connected to the INBO IPT and documented with metadata.
- The dataset is published and registered with GBIF.
Additional Metadata
We like to thank the many volunteers for creating this dataset.
| Acknowledgements | We like to thank the many volunteers for creating this dataset. |
|---|---|
| Alternative Identifiers | https://ipt.inbo.be/resource?r=meetnetten-vleermuizen-wintertelling-individu-occurrences |