Members of the African Insect Atlas project attended a niche modelling workshop from January 31st to Februray 2nd 2018 at the Madagascar Biodiversity Centre, Tsimbazaza Antananarivo, Madagascar. All six consortium partners took part in this three-day workshop (Madagascar, Kenya, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Botswana and South Africa). This workshop was designed to provide participants with an insight into data modelling for species and how to use distribution records for conservation planning. The workshop also provided an opportunity to update participants on the progress of the African Insect Atlas BID project. Content during the workshop included a mixture of theory taught by presentations and case studies with open discussions. There was options to work on participants own data and explore the case study papers in group sessions. For the workshop, two case studies to work on over the 3-day workshop were selected from a list of relelvant themes including:
- Invasions
- Climate change
- Targeting field surveys
- Species delimination
- Paleo-ecological niches and climate reconstruction
- IUCN red listing
- Themes selected in other fields of interest by participants
Participants were also invited to attend an excursion to Andasibe-Mantadia National Park, Madagascar.
Specific topics for the workshop included:
- Introduction to the AIA (African Insect Altas)
- Introduction and overview of principles and applications of ENM/SDM
- Data sourcing, management, quality and georeferencing
- Data & exploration modelling (Practical excercise)
- BIOCLIM and model evaluation using DIVA
- Modelling algorithms
- Model evaluations
- Modelling ants using Maxtent GUI
- Expectations of data outputs
- Using Maxtent's command line
- Conservation planning: GAP analysis, terrestrial and marine organisms
- Thresholds and Over-prediction
- Clinic on advancing skills, planning independant modelling projects
- Debate on the current BID project progress & the African Malaise Transect
