Description
This dataset contains 299 occurrence records of 192 nocturnal Lepidoptera species collected in the Mut district of Mersin Province, on the southern slopes of the central Taurus Mountains, southern Türkiye. Records were obtained during 32 sampling events at 21 localities on 28 dates between April 2021 and August 2024, along an elevational gradient from 150 to 1750 m a.s.l. Specimens were collected by light trapping and hand netting, and all records are supported by preserved voucher material deposited in the entomological collection of the Department of Biology, Mersin University (ENTOLAB). The dataset covers ten families within seven superfamilies, of which Noctuidae and Geometridae are the most species-rich. It provides the first documented occurrence data for nocturnal Lepidoptera from this part of the eastern Mediterranean and forms the basis of an annotated checklist published separately.
Data Records
The data in this occurrence resource has been published as a Darwin Core Archive (DwC-A), which is a standardized format for sharing biodiversity data as a set of one or more data tables. The core data table contains 299 records.
This IPT archives the data and thus serves as the data repository. The data and resource metadata are available for download in the downloads section. The versions table lists other versions of the resource that have been made publicly available and allows tracking changes made to the resource over time.
Versions
The table below shows only published versions of the resource that are publicly accessible.
How to cite
Researchers should cite this work as follows:
Hüseyinoğlu Y (2026). Nocturnal Lepidoptera of Mut district (Mersin, Türkiye), 2021-2024. Version 1.7. Biodiversity Data Journal. Occurrence dataset. https://ipt.pensoft.net/resource?r=mut-nocturnal-lepidoptera&v=1.7
Rights
Researchers should respect the following rights statement:
The publisher and rights holder of this work is Biodiversity Data Journal. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY 4.0) License.
GBIF Registration
This resource has been registered with GBIF, and assigned the following GBIF UUID: 10bf8fde-5a9e-4591-ae3c-f3be1c5a0af3. Biodiversity Data Journal publishes this resource, and is itself registered in GBIF as a data publisher endorsed by GBIF Bulgaria.
Keywords
Lepidoptera; moths; faunistics; biodiversity inventory; light trapping; elevational gradient; Taurus Mountains; Mediterranean; Türkiye; occurrence records; Occurrence
Contacts
- Metadata Provider ●
- Originator ●
- Point Of Contact
- Assoc. Prof. Dr.
Geographic Coverage
Mut district, Mersin Province, southern Türkiye, on the southern slopes of the central Taurus Mountains within the northern Mediterranean phytogeographic region. The area is drained by the Göksu River and comprises a mosaic of Mediterranean maquis, pine and oak forest, cedar forest, steppe and agricultural land across an elevational range of 150-1750 m a.s.l.
| Bounding Coordinates | South West [36.487, 33.055], North East [36.904, 33.639] |
|---|
Taxonomic Coverage
Nocturnal Lepidoptera (moths) of ten families within seven superfamilies. Noctuidae (72 species) and Geometridae (43 species) account for the greater part of the dataset. Butterflies (Papilionoidea) were not targeted and are not included.
| Order | Lepidoptera (moths) |
|---|---|
| Family | Cossidae, Pyralidae, Crambidae, Drepanidae, Lasiocampidae, Sphingidae, Geometridae, Erebidae, Nolidae, Noctuidae |
Temporal Coverage
| Start Date / End Date | 2021-04-07 / 2024-08-31 |
|---|
Project Data
No Description available
| Title | Nocturnal Lepidoptera in the Mut |
|---|
The personnel involved in the project:
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4043-0817
Sampling Methods
Moths were attracted to a 160 W mercury-vapour lamp suspended in front of a white sheet measuring 2 x 3 m and powered by a portable generator. Traps were operated from dusk until the early hours of the morning on nights with little moonlight and little wind. Crepuscular and low-flying species were additionally taken with an aerial net of 40 cm diameter. Specimens were killed with ethyl acetate and labelled in the field with date, locality, elevation and coordinates. Coordinates were recorded with a Garmin GPSMAP 64sx receiver (nominal accuracy 5 m).
| Study Extent | Thirty-two sampling events were carried out at 21 localities in the Mut district between April 2021 and August 2024, distributed across the full elevational gradient of the district from 150 to 1750 m a.s.l. Sampling was confined to the period April-August; no surveys were made between September and March. |
|---|---|
| Quality Control | Specimens were spread, dried at 40 degrees C for 48-72 hours and permanently labelled. Identifications were made under an Olympus SZ51 stereomicroscope using the standard European reference works for Geometridae, Noctuidae, Pyraloidea and Sphingidae, and were cross-checked against the online resources Lepidoptera Mundi and Lepiforum. All 192 species are represented by voucher specimens deposited in the ENTOLAB collection and are available for re-examination. |
Method step description:
- Field sampling by light trapping and netting.
- Laboratory preparation, drying and labelling of specimens.
- Morphological identification and verification against reference literature.
- Transcription of label data into a Darwin Core occurrence table.
Additional Metadata
| Alternative Identifiers | 10bf8fde-5a9e-4591-ae3c-f3be1c5a0af3 |
|---|---|
| https://ipt.pensoft.net/resource?r=mut-nocturnal-lepidoptera |