AUTHOR’S POSTPRINT Published version of this article at http://omicron.ch.tuiasi.ro/EEMJ/issues/vol11/vol11no6.htm 1 Environmental Engineering and Management Journal, June 2012, Vol.11, No. 6: 1059-1075. Primary Biodiversity Data Records in the Pyrenees Arturo H. Ariño * , Javier Otegui, Ana Villarroya, Anabel Pérez de Zabalza Department of Zoology and Ecology, University of Navarra, E-31080 Pamplona, Spain Abstract We characterize the primary biodiversity data records that have been made public for retrieval for the Pyrenean region. Such data, spanning more than a hundred years, have been collected by many institutions and individual researchers and digitized in databases, some of which have been shared through the Global Biodiversity Information Facility platform by using a standard format, Darwin Core. The datasets are not homogeneous in extent, coverage, taxonomy, or accuracy. Differences arising from taxonomic depth or group, georeferencing precision, age of collection, and other features result in biases and gaps that may influence the fitness for use of such data. Knowledge of patterns found in the data may help researchers and managers operating in the Pyrenees to estimate the reliability of available information, and to assess what uses for the data are acceptable. Keywords Pyrenees, biodiversity, digital assets, data availability Introduction Sound environmental management calls for thorough knowledge of ecosystems and its components, as success stories attest (e.g. Boesch 2006). Such knowledge requires field data, of which primary biodiversity data is one of the most basic types. Mountain areas, both sensitive to global change (Pauli et al., 2001) and distinct in terms of biodiversity components (Körner, 2004), harbor fragile ecosystems (Wohl, 2006). The Pyrenean Range, running along the French-Spanish border, has been traditionally subject to heavy impact from human activities that have shaped its ecosystems (Gutiérrez Elorza, 2007) at ever increasingly remote reaches. Such changes frequently result in land cover change, itself a primary cause for biodiversity change (Gonzalez et al., 2011). Sustained work in research projects has produced sizable amounts of biodiversity data, and knowledge about the range’s ecosystems has built on these. Ariño (2010) estimated at 2 x 10 9 primary records the volume of data stored in natural history collections only. However, a question remains whether this mass of data can be used in full, or, as argued by Hill et al. (2010), its fitness-for-use is dependent on how such data were recorded, digitized, and shared. Further inferences on biodiversity patterns, such as species distribution, population evolution or, more importantly, range changes potentially tied to (or becoming indicators of) climate * Author to whom all correspondence should be addressed: artarip@unav.es