Map of Life
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Frequently Asked Questions

What are Map of Life species lists?

Map of Life (MOL) species lists are hypotheses about which plant and animal species are likely to occur at a given site based on the spatial biodiversity datasets curated on Map of Life. These lists are intended to give users data-backed forecasts about which species might occur in their area of interest – from a single national park to an entire province or country.

The accuracy of these species lists depends on the quality and amount of available biodiversity data. Data coverage is uneven across regions and taxa around the world, so the accuracy of species lists can differ across sites. For regions and taxa that have excellent data coverage (such as birds in France), MOL species lists should be more accurate expectations of the species that occur at a site. For regions and taxa that have poorer data coverage (such as butterflies in Guyana), MOL species lists are less accurate but provide a data-backed hypothesis of expected species that can be used as a triage tool to support further research.

How does MOL generate species lists?

MOL species lists are generated by calculating the overlap in a geographic region with the spatial distributions of species in the MOL database. This computational process is vastly sped up by the use of geohashes – a spatial data structure that encodes locations on the Earth’s surface in alphanumeric strings. Geohashes split the Earth’s surface into a grid that gets progressively finer as we increase the geohash level; geohash level 5 is more precise than geohash level 4. One geohash 5 grid cell is 24 km2 in area.

We encode all species spatial information, from expert range maps to occurrences, in geohash 5. For any selected site, instead of computing the spatial intersection of the site against the database of spatial species information, we simply compare the alphanumeric strings for the geohash level 5 grid cells in that site to a database of species geohash level 5 strings. Since the geohash level 5 cells are fine-scale, the lists generated by this process tend to be precise – however, sometimes there are cases where the edges of a species range and a selected site occur within the same geohash cell but do not actually overlap. It’s important to remember that expert range maps hold intrinsic uncertainty, so we prefer to be more inclusive in the generation of expected species lists rather than exclude species that are likely to still occur in the site.

For large regions, such as countries, we pre-compute this geohash matching at scheduled intervals to ensure fast loading time for the species lists of those regions. For smaller regions, such as protected areas, states, or user-defined regions, these computations are done on the fly.

Where is the data from?

Map of Life compiles biodiversity data from a huge variety of sources, a comprehensive list of which is available at mol.org/datasets. To see which dataset or datasets are responsible for the inclusion of a particular species in a MOL species list, click on the species or its datasets link (highlighted by red boxes in the example below).

Where is the data from?

Full information on the datasets available for a given species is provided on its MOL Species page.

The biodiversity data compiled by MOL comes in several different formats, including expert species range maps and distribution models, occurrence points, local inventories, and regional checklists. At present, MOL uses all of these data sources to generate MOL species lists for a given region. These include:

Occurrence point: A point location where a species has been directly observed, by sight, sound, or the collection of a physical specimen.

Local inventory: A list of species that were observed within a certain geographic area, such as a national park, by a team of humans and/or by machine observations (e.g., cameras) over a survey period.

Expert range map: A polygon drawn by a human expert to show all the areas where a particular species is known or expected to live.

Species distribution model: A map that quantifies the likelihood of a species’ presence over a geographic area based on predictive models, occurrence points for that species, and environmental data layers.

Some of our major data sources include the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species for expert range maps and GBIF and eBird for occurrence points. Our database also draws from hundreds of published scientific studies, local inventories, and regional biodiversity modeling efforts, such as the BioModelos species distribution modeling initiative in Colombia.

You can explore and filter all datasets compiled by Map of Life at mol.org/datasets.

How does MOL standardize taxonomic nomenclatures across datasets?

Extensive work has been conducted by taxonomic experts to compile global master taxonomies for amphibians, ants, birds, butterflies, crabs, fishes, mammals, odonates, and reptiles. MOL uses these master taxonomies to harmonize scientific names in incoming datasets to avoid taxonomic mismatches and maintain a consistent taxonomic standard. MOL master taxonomies include accepted names and synonyms from the primary authorities for each taxon, which are then matched with incoming scientific names to conduct the most thorough name resolution possible.

The taxonomic sources for each taxa are as follows:

VertebratesAmphibiansBirdsFishMammalsReptilesInvertebratesAntsBeesButterflies
  • Master taxonomy: Map of Life Lepidoptera integrated taxonomy, Pinkert 2022
  • Sources of synonyms:
CrabsOdonatesPlants

Do MOL species lists include recorded species, expected species, or both?

Both. At present, MOL generates species lists for a given region using both evidence that certain species have been recorded there in the past (e.g., direct observations) and predictions that certain species will be recorded there in the future (e.g., expert range maps). The first list you see includes both categories.

To only see a list of expected species, click the filter(s) under Expected Sources. To only see a list of recorded species, click the filter(s) under Recorded Sources (highlighted by red boxes in the example below).

Expected species

A list of recorded species is a more conservative estimate of the species that live in a selected area, while a list of recorded and expected species is more inclusive. However, it is important to note that the availability of different data types is not equal across taxonomic groups. For example, there are many species of plants for whom we have occurrence points and inventory data but not expert range maps or models. As a result, these species may only appear in the recorded list and not in the expected list.

Additionally, recorded data may include species that were observed in a particular area but are not necessarily part of the ecosystem – for example, a vagrant bird or captive animal observed far out of its native range. Expected data types, on the other hand, only include areas where a species occurs naturally (including naturalized alien ranges).

To assist in your analysis and interpretation of species lists for your selected area, we include in the download file information on the data types available for each species and the exact source of each data type.

Why are some taxa missing from my selected area?

For all vertebrate groups (mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, turtles, and fish), certain plant groups (conifers, cacti, and palms), and some invertebrates, we have global coverage of expert range maps in MOL, meaning that these species are accounted for in expected species lists for all areas around the world. For other taxa, including several invertebrate and plant groups, expert range map coverage is restricted to certain regions of the Earth, so those groups will not be accounted for in expected species list for areas falling outside of that coverage.

To explore taxonomic coverage of expert range maps and other dataset types, you can visit https://mol.org/datasets and select any data type and taxonomic group to view the global coverage of those datasets.

Do these lists change over time?

Yes – our species database is constantly being updated, so the species list generation is also frequently changing. New data is not ingested on a set schedule, so it’s hard to anticipate when changes might happen in the species lists. Occurrence data is the most frequently updated data type, as well pull these data from sources like GBIF and eBird. Local inventories, regional checklists, and expert range maps are generally updated less frequently, as any new data must be ingested from a new dataset.

For speed, large parks, countries, and states have precalculated lists and are recomputed on a monthly basis. Regions less than 25,000km2 in area, regions that are user uploaded, buffered points, and hand drawn regions are computed on the fly.

What other data can I download along with the species lists?

Species lists can be downloaded as CSV files. Each CSV contains two sections: Datasets and Species. The “Datasets” section lists the dataset ID, taxonomic group, title, and full citation for each dataset included in the species list along with the link for that dataset on Map of Life’s Datasets page. The “Species” section lists the scientific and common name, family, taxonomic group, and IUCN Red List status of each species in the list along with the link for the Map of Life species page and the relevant dataset ID.

Project Background

Map of Life Regions was created in partnership with the Field Museum who have been integral in supporting the design and development of this tool. This partnership began with an effort to create species list functionality for three countries – Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru – with whom the Field Museum closely collaborates with field biologists conducting biodiversity inventories on the ground. This effort culminated in the Map of Life Biodiversity Dashboards tool which supported species list generation for subnational areas in the three countries. Now, we have scaled up this functionality to provide sub-national region species lists for the entire world. This tool would not be possible without the efforts by the Field Museum to seek and consolidate feedback from their conservation partners.

How to Cite

To cite data from Map of Life Regions, please refer to both the individual dataset citations provided in the downloadable species list file and provide a Map of Life Regions citation in the following format:

Map of Life Regions. (year). Species list for (site), based on a large number of biodiversity datasets. Generated on (date) at (URL).

as well as the original Map of Life article citation:

Jetz W., McPherson J. M., Guralnick R. P., Integrating biodiversity distribution knowledge: Toward a global map of life. Trends Ecol. Evol. 27, 151–159 (2012). 10.1016/j.tree.2011.09.007

Known issues and how to address them

Captive species The cleaning process applied to the occurrence records in our database is not perfect, so we expect that some recorded observations of captive individuals (e.g., zoos, farms, pets, etc.) have been retained in the occurrences datasets. You may see some species within the lists that are clearly not native or introduced to the selected area but are rather captive animals. Addressing this issue may require a manual inspection of all the species that have been recorded in the selected area, but are not expected to occur there based on expert range maps and other expected sources.

Extinct species You may come across recently extinct or presumed extinct species in your species lists. This occurs because the occurrence points for those species still exist in the GBIF database, as do range maps for those species in various expert range map datasets, which Map of Life pulls from to generate the species lists. These species can be identified and filtered out of the species list through the IUCN Threat Status column, which lists “Extinct” status. Note that for species that were only recently declared extinct, we may not have the most up-to-date IUCN status.

Very small regions When an area of interest is very small, it often lacks the full range of habitat and vegetation types available on the larger landscape. This may lead to an overestimate of the species that occur at the site, as the species list includes specialists of habitats that are not represented there. For example, the species list of a tiny park may include species that specialize on swamps even though the park does not contain any swamp. To address this issue, spot-checks of the species list are highly recommended for small areas.