Checklist of alien herpetofauna of Belgium

Study Extent

The checklist incorporates all records of alien herpetofauna observed in the wild in Belgium (subdivided for each of the three main political regions). Both established species and casual records were included.

Sampling

The data for this checklist are curated from several sources: literature, a citizen science portal, animal shelter databases, news articles, firsthand accounts and own records. The majority of the data for all three political regions is derived from the citizen science portal https://waarnemingen.be/, available through GBIF (Vanreusel et al. 2020). For Flanders, a considerable second source of data are the various animal shelters, operating under Vogelbescherming Vlaanderen, and SOS Reptiel, a non-profit animal shelter specialized in reptiles and amphibians. For Wallonia, data is shared by Natagora, a non-profit nature conservation organisation. Literature, firsthand accounts, news articles and own records constitute a minority of the data in the checklist.

Quality Control

All records are individually validated by species experts (resource creators of this dataset) based on data sources and available information. Unreliable records lacking details were omitted from the dataset.

Method steps

1. The source data for this standardized checklist is a Google Spreadsheet and re-uploaded regularly at https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1V_rQhyz_AjszobCMxBe-xFWI3kUNLrYzMeqyUNt3Vc4/edit#gid=0
2. This raw data file was uploaded to a GitHub repository (https://github.com/trias-project/alien-herpetofauna-belgium).
3. We developed a RMarkdown script to document and perform the transformation of the data to Darwin Core, which includes the following steps:
4. Perform some basic data cleaning of the raw data.
5. Generate stable and unique identifiers for each taxon (taxonID).
6. Create a taxon core file (http://rs.gbif.org/core/dwc_taxon.xml).
7. Create a distribution extension file (http://rs.gbif.org/extension/gbif/1.0/distribution.xml), including standardization of the distribution date range and event dates.
8. Create a species profile extension file (http://rs.gbif.org/extension/gbif/1.0/speciesprofile.xml), with coarse habitat information.
9. Create a description extension file (http://rs.gbif.org/extension/gbif/1.0/description.xml), with standardized pathway of introduction (using the pathway vocabulary from the Convention on Biological Diversity (2014)), native range, and degree of establishment (based on Blackburn et al. (2011)).
10. The resulting Darwin Core data files are uploaded to the INBO IPT and documented with metadata.
11. The dataset is published and registered with GBIF.

In total, this dataset includes over 100 alien herpetofauna species.

1. Animalia
   rank: kingdom
2. Amphibia
   common name: Amphibians rank: class
3. Reptilia
   common name: Reptiles rank: class
4. Squamata
   rank: order
5. Testudines
   rank: order
6. Anura
   rank: order
7. Crocodilia
   rank: order
8. Urodela
   rank: order

The dataset includes information on the presence of alien herpetofauna species in Flanders, Wallonia and the Brussels Capital Region (the three main political regions in Belgium).