BMS schemes

Butterfly Monitoring Schemes

Butterfly Monitoring Schemes (BMS) record butterflies every year, by counting them along fixed routes called transects. This vital information is gathered mainly by citizen scientists (volunteers) who have been trained (or are self-taught) to recognise and identify species and follow the protocols of monitoring along butterfly transects.

Butterflies are one of the best-monitored insect groups in Europe thanks to the long-term monitoring schemes that have been running for decades in some countries. The first Butterfly Monitoring Scheme began in the United Kingdom in 1976 (UKBMS), and since then, this methodology has been adopted in many other European countries to monitor butterflies. All use the same standardised survey method, designed by Ernie Pollard, of the Monks Wood Experimental Station in the UK (Pollard and Yates, 1983). The transects (fixed routes) are counted repeatedly through the butterfly season, ideally every week but often less frequently due to the availability of volunteers or due to unsuitable weather. Statistical modeling techniques have been developed to account for uneven sampling and enable standardized assessments of changes in abundance over time. The methodology provides robust data to identify population trends and assess the status of butterfly species.

 

The eBMS network includes several partners thatv4 provide their data every year from the different National Butterfly Monitoring Schemes throughout Europe. Currently, there are 35 BMS, with 21 that are officially part of the eBMS distributed across 30 countries.

Click on the countries to see their National BMS websites and discover more about their butterfly monitoring, how to join and contact them.

 

Austria - AUBMS

Austria (Viel-Falter) - VFBMS

Belgium (Flanders) - BEBMS

Belgium (Wallonie) - WABMS

Bulgaria - BUBMS

Croatia - HRBMS

Cyprus - CyBMS

Czech Republic - CZBMS

Estonia - EEBMS

Finland FIBMS

France - FRBMS

Germany - DEBMS

Greece (Apollo) - ELBMS

Hungary - HUBMS

Ireland - IRBMS

Italy - ITBMS website

Latvia - LVBMS

Lithuania - LTBMS

Luxembourg - LUBMS

Malta - MABMS

Norway -  NOBMS

Poland - PLBMS

Portugal - PTBMS

Romania - ROBMS

Slovenia - SIBMS

Spain (Catalonia) - ES-CTBMS

Spain (Zerynthia) - ES-CBBMS

Spain (excl. Catalonia, Zerynthia) - ESBMS

Sweden - SEBMS

Switzerland (BDM) - CHBMS

Switzerland (volunteers basis) - CHBMS

The Netherlands  - NLBMS

Turkey - TUBMS

UK - UKBMS

 

*Outside Europe

Japan - JPBMS

 

The map shows the density of Butterfly Monitoring transects visited per 50km grid across all schemes that have contributed to the eBMS database (as of v4.0, data up to 2020). Densities are calculated from sites that have been visited at least once since 2000. Graphs: a) Number of Butterfly Monitoring transects that contributed to the European Butterfly Indicator (1990-2020), where schemes within EU27 are represented in dark blue and non-EU schemes in light blue. b) Number of Schemes contributing, with 24 BMS operating across 20 EU27 member states. 

 

 

 

If you want to set up a new transect in one of these countries, please follow the links in each country and try to contact the main coordinator. Some countries have their own online system to manage national Butterfly Monitoring Schemes. 

For requesting data from the eBMS database, please go to the page eBMS data access policy to read and see how to do this process.