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Inventory of alien macroinvertebrates in Flanders, Belgium
Citation
Boets P, Lock K, Mertens J, Goethals P, Adriaens T, Groom Q, Brosens D, Desmet P, Reyserhove L (2018): Inventory of alien macroinvertebrates in Flanders, Belgium. v1.5. Ghent University. Dataset/Checklist. https://doi.org/10.15468/yxcq07
Contact: Boets, Pieter

Access data
Archived data
Availability: CC0 To the extent possible under law, the person who associated CC0 with this dataset has waived all copyright and related or neighboring rights to this dataset.

Description
The Inventory of alien macroinvertebrates in Flanders, Belgium is a species checklist dataset published by Ghent University. It contains information on 73 alien macroinvertebrate species (mostly crustaceans and molluscs) occurring in Flemish aquatic habitats, from inland lakes to coastal harbours at the North Sea. more

The inventory is the result of the study Boets et al. (2016) (https://doi.org/10.3391/ai.2016.11.2.03 with occurrence data at https://doi.org/10.15468/xjtfoo) where it was originally published as supplementary material. Here it is published as a standardized Darwin Core Archive and includes for each species: the scientific name, higher classification, and stable taxon identifier (in the taxon core), the year of first introduction and last assessment in Flanders (given as a year range in the event date in the distribution extension), coarse habitat information (in the species profile extension) and the pathway(s) of introduction, native range(s), and invasion stage in Flanders (in the description extension). The dataset can be used for researching and managing aquatic invasions or compiling regional and national registries of alien species. Issues with the dataset can be reported at: https://github.com/trias-project/alien-macroinvertebrates. This checklist covers alien macroinvertebrate species found in different aquatic habitats in Flanders (northern Belgium), including all types of waterways, lakes, and coastal habitats. The proximity to the sea, the interconnection of different waterways, the high degree of canalisation, and the presence of several harbours make Flemish watercourses susceptible to aquatic invasions (Boets et al. 2016).
In total, 73 alien macroinvertebrate species have been collected in Flanders of which 52 are regularly encountered in fresh and/or slightly brackish waters. The remaining 21 species are restricted to the marine environment for at least a considerable share of their lifetime. Most alien macroinvertebrate species are crustaceans (51%), followed by Mollusca (27%), Annelida (19%) and Platyhelminthes (3%). Most alien macroinvertebrates originate from North America (37%) or the Ponto-Caspian region (21%). The main vector of introduction is probably passive transport via the hull of ships (biofouling) and ballast water (71%). The transport via canals is the second main vector (28%) and promoted the dispersion of alien macroinvertebrates. Also, some species were introduced through aquaculture (17%) and hobbyists (6%) (Boets et al. 2016).

Scope
Themes:
Biology > Invertebrates
Keywords:
Marine/Coastal, Fresh water, Brackish water, Checklists, Introduced species, Inventory, Belgium: Flanders, Annelida, Arthropoda, Mollusca, Platyhelminthes

Geographical coverage
Belgium: Flanders

Temporal coverage
1 January 1600 - 31 December 2016

Taxonomic coverage
Annelida [WoRMS]
Arthropoda [WoRMS]
Mollusca [WoRMS]
Platyhelminthes [WoRMS]

Parameter
Occurrence of biota

Contributors
Universiteit Gent (UGent), moredata creator
Vlaamse overheid; Beleidsdomein Omgeving; Instituut voor Natuur- en Bosonderzoek (INBO), moredata creator
Vlaamse overheid; Beleidsdomein Economie, Wetenschap en Innovatie; Plantentuin Meise, moredata creator

Dataset status: Completed
Data type: Data
Data origin: Data collection
Metadatarecord created: 2018-11-29
Information last updated: 2019-04-12
All data in the Integrated Marine Information System (IMIS) is subject to the VLIZ privacy policy