Strengthening Pollinator Recovery through INdicators and monitorinG

SPRING is funded by the European Commission and supports preparation for the implementation of the EU Pollinator Monitoring Scheme (EU PoMS) for wild bees, butterflies, hoverflies and moths using volunteer and professional recorders.

The Core Scheme of SPRING project will include:
Expanding the European Butterfly Monitoring Scheme (eBMS) by creating new schemes in 6 EU countries: Denmark, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovakia and Romania. This will achieve complete coverage of eBMS partnerships in all EU Member States. It will also provide ongoing support to the 10 national schemes that were set up under the ABLE project. Butterfly monitoring uses standardised transects and is mostly carried out by trained volunteers as a form of citizen science.

Building up the capacity of citizen science networks on pollinators across Europe. Some EU countries have a strong baseline of citizen science whereas other countries, particularly in southern and eastern Europe currently have very little citizen science capability. The project will recruit and train more coordinators and volunteers across Europe who are willing to collect data on butterflies, moths, wild bees and hoverflies from the field and report it to the newly developed online database.

Organising advanced taxonomic training to the next generation of taxonomists in Europe, with a focus on wild bees and hoverflies. The aim is to achieve a minimum expert capacity in each EU Member State that can deliver the EU Pollinator Monitoring Scheme (EU PoMS). The experts will be capable of identifying most specimens to species level, with support from the established advanced taxonomy institutes for the remainder of the specimens.

Piloting a Minimum Viable Scheme (MVS) for wild bees, butterflies and hoverflies by monitoring at a small number of sites in every EU Member State, using standardised transects walked by professionals and volunteers. Wild bees and hoverflies will also be monitored by professionals using pan traps.