This citizen science project was started up in order to follow the population trend of the European stag beetle. In order to analyze the data, we need long-term data so that is why we take a look at the data entered this year and the transects that have been continued.
This year, we received data from 91 transect walks. That is quite a bit lower than the previous years (136 in 2018 and 115 in 2019). Mainly in Germany, the Netherlands and United Kingdom, the number of transect walks decreased. Luckily, in many other regions the number of walks remained stable or even increased. Furthermore, the first transect walks for France were added.
The same trend is visible if we look at the number of transects with four or more transect walks: 13 in 2019 compared to 19 and 16 in the previous years.
So please keep up the good work, we need long time series if we want to asses population increases or declines. If you skipped your transect one or two year, no problem but take up the work again this year. Only transects repeated in more than one year, can be analyzed to see any decline.
