Boston Harbor Islands All Taxa Biodiversity Inventory: Discovering the Microwilderness of an Urban Island Park.

摘要

The Boston Harbor Islands Partnership (BHIP) and the Museum of Comparative Zoology (MCZ) at Harvard University collaborated to conduct the first phase of an All Taxa Biodiversity Inventory (ATBI) in Boston Harbor Islands national park area, Boston, Massachusetts. This six-year phase of the ATBI focused on the microwilderness of the park, a vast realm of invertebrate animals. The main objectives of this phase of the ATBI were threefold: (1) to document the diversity and distribution of arthropod and mollusk taxa in the park; (2) to engage and educate students and the public about local invertebrate biodiversity; (3) to use biodiversity data to inform park management. The project relied on the participation of more than fifty students, interns, citizen scientists, and volunteers to collect invertebrates on nineteen islands, and to sort, prepare, image, and database more than 75,000 specimens in the lab. Additionally, more than forty taxonomists from North America and Europe donated their time and expertise to identify 1,732 species and morphospecies. All specimens are permanently housed in the collections at the MCZ.