Data Set Citation:
When using this data, please cite the data package:
Nakadai R , Nakadai R , Kobayashi T , and Hashimoto K.
Dataset of forewing length of Japanese and Taiwanese butterfly species
ERDP-2020-11.1.2 (https://db.cger.nies.go.jp/JaLTER/metacat/metacat/ERDP-2020-11.1.2/jalter-en)
General Information:
Title:Dataset of forewing length of Japanese and Taiwanese butterfly species
Identifier:ERDP-2020-11.1.2
Abstract:
Revealing how species assemblages are structured is one of the themes in community ecology and macroecology. The information of species traits as well as geographic occurrence would help analyze the pattern and process of species interactions and community assembly. Butterfly species are one of the best‐studied groups about their distribution and tons of their occurrence data exist. Also, life history traits, especially interaction with host plants are well‐described. However, the body size information is still poor although this is one of the most important characters affecting their distribution and life history traits. Here, we constructed a data set of the forewing length of butterflies by extracting the information from five Japanese and Taiwanese picture books. We measured 6,211 forewing lengths for a total of 524 species. Scientific, family and common names of the butterflies distributed in Japan were based on a Japanese picture book, and the other species distributed in Taiwan were based on Taiwanese picture books. Also, we added the information of butterfly names based on Binran database. Each record of butterflies is linked with the corresponding taxonomic names in the other two books to easily identify the species even when the names used in the three books and the Binran database are not the same. The dataset will be useful for basic and applied biological studies of butterflies because their forewing length is a proxy of their body size and dispersal ability, which could be important determinants of their physiology, distribution, ecosystem functioning and evolution.
Keywords:
  • body size
  • Lepidoptera
  • life history
  • literature study
  • macroecology
Data Table, Image, and Other Data Details:
Metadata download: Ecological Metadata Language (EML) File
Data Table:Forewing_length.csv ( View Metadata | Download File download)
Data Table:Name_list.csv ( View Metadata | Download File download)
Data Table:Reference.csv ( View Metadata | Download File download)
Other Data:data_descriptor ( View Metadata | Download File download)

Involved Parties

Data Set Owners:
Individual: Ryosuke Nakadai
Organization:Department of Environmental and Biological Sciences, University of Eastern Finland
Address:
7,
Yliopistokatu, Joensuu FI-80101 Finland
Email Address:
r.nakadai66@gmail.com
Individual: Ryosuke Nakadai
Organization:Department of Ecosystem Studies, Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences, The University of Tokyo
Address:
1-1-1 Yayoi,
Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-8657 Japan
Email Address:
r.nakadai66@gmail.com
Individual: Takuya Kobayashi
Organization:Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute,
Address:
1 Matsunosato,
Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8687 Japan
Email Address:
tkobayashi925@gmail.com
Individual: Koya Hashimoto
Organization:Department of Environmental Management, Faculty of Agriculture, KINDAI University
Address:
Nakamachi, 3327-204,
Nara, Nara 631-8505 Japan
Email Address:
atrophaneura4@gmail.com
Data Set Contacts:
Individual: Ryosuke Nakadai
Organization:Department of Environmental and Biological Sciences, University of Eastern Finland
Address:
7,
Yliopistokatu, Joensuu FI-80101 Finland
Email Address:
r.nakadai66@gmail.com
Individual: Ryosuke Nakadai
Organization:Department of Ecosystem Studies, Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences, The University of Tokyo
Address:
1-1-1 Yayoi,
Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-8657 Japan
Email Address:
r.nakadai66@gmail.com
Associated Parties:
Individual: Nakadai Ryosuke
Organization:Department of Environmental and Biological Sciences, University of Eastern Finland
Address:
7,
Yliopistokatu, Joensuu FI-80101 Finland
Email Address:
r.nakadai66@gmail.com
Individual: Ryosuke Nakadai
Organization:Department of Ecosystem Studies, Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences, The University of Tokyo
Address:
1-1-1 Yayoi,
Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-8657 Japan
Email Address:
r.nakadai66@gmail.com
Individual: Takuya Kobayashi
Organization:Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute
Address:
1 Matsunosato,
Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8687 Japan
Email Address:
tkobayashi925@gmail.com
Individual: Koya Hashimoto
Organization:Department of Environmental Management, Faculty of Agriculture, KINDAI University
Address:
Nakamachi, 3327-204,
Nara, Nara 631-8505 Japan
Email Address:
atrophaneura4@gmail.com

Data Set Characteristics

Geographic Region:
Geographic Description:Japan
Bounding Coordinates:
West:  123.0  degrees
East:  154.0  degrees
North:  46.0  degrees
South:  20.0  degrees
Geographic Region:
Geographic Description:Taiwan
Bounding Coordinates:
West:  120.0  degrees
East:  122.0  degrees
North:  25.0  degrees
South:  22.0  degrees
Time Period:
Begin:
1960
End:
2013

Sampling, Processing and Quality Control Methods

Step by Step Procedures
Step 1:
Description:

Data collection

We compiled wing data on 524 species using three published illustrations (Hsu, 2013a, 2013b, 2013c; Shirozu, 1960, 2006). We used Image J software (Abramoff, Magalhaes, & Ram, 2004) to extract forewing lengths (in mm) from plates that included scale bars. All of forewing lengths were extracted with the described information of their sex and locality where they were collected, except for the pictures which do not include abdomen. Forewing length is length between central joint with abdomen to the top of forewing (Shirozu, 2006). We basically chose a wing on the right of each picture. If the right one could not be measured, we choose the left one. Taxonomic names of Japanese and Taiwanese butterflies are based on Shirozu (2006) and Hsu (2013a, 2013b, 2013c), respectively. Also, we put the column of butterfly names based on Binran (Inomata, Uemura, Yago, Jinbo, & Ueda, 2010-2013), which are used in the previous data paper of host plant of Japanese butterflies (Saito et al., 2016). Each record of butterflies is linked with the corresponding taxonomic names in the other two books to easily identify the species even when the names used in the three books are not the same. The data includes 6,211 forewing lengths for total 524 species (Papilionidae, Pieridae, Lycaenidae, Nymphalidae, Hesperiidae) finally, and the forewing lengths are 25.8 ± 11.93 mm (mean ± standard deviation).

Data Set Usage Rights

The dataset is published under the Creative Commons License Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 (CC BY-SA, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ Accessed 31 August 2019).
Access Control:
Auth System:JaLTER
Order:allowFirst
Allow: [read] public
Metadata download: Ecological Metadata Language (EML) File