Tony and I had another interesting day at the National Moth Recorders Meeting in Birmingham on Saturday.
Some very interesting speakers and presentations that I am not going to go into now as these may well be available on YouTube before very long, watch this space.
Some very interesting speakers and presentations that I am not going to go into now as these may well be available on YouTube before very long, watch this space.
If you would like to see if there is anything that interests you the agenda for the day can be viewed in the new copy of Emoth by clicking here
New! National Micro-moth Recording Scheme
Probably the single biggest and arguably most important announcement is that from 1st April, the National Moth Recording Scheme will start to accept micro-moth records for the first time! Micro-moth records, however, will go through a more thorough verification process than macro-moths.
Every species and commonly-recorded stage has been allocated a grade similar to the grades on some moth group websites. All records within reason will be verified according to these criteria - by the way, these national grades and recording criteria have been designed by many acknowledged taxa experts, people with a vast amount of experience and know what they are talking about. However, there will be instances where local grades and rulesets may overrule the national guidelines. I will ensure these guidelines are made available in due course along with any other relevant details for the recording and verification of micro-moths.
There are now three possible levels of verification:
Firstly, the County Recorder (CMR); if, for any reason, I feel I am unable to verify a species' record, I will now have at my disposal a Regional Verification Panel (RVP) of experts in order to help me make an informed decision.
If, for any reason, the RVP are unable to verify that record, it will be referred to a National Verification Panel of experts for a final decision.
The NVP will also have access to the full dataset in the National Moth Recording Scheme for final verification checks as they see fit.
In all instances, the CMRs, or Verification Panel’s decision will be final. There will be feedback throughout the verification process.
The data we provide to the national schemes must be robust as our data are used to make informed policy and conservation decisions.
I thought the most important announcement was the Danish lady telling us if we chewed apple pips from about 6 apples, we would die from cyanide poisoning! The audience gasp was excellent at that point.
ReplyDeleteI am hoping that presentation appears on YouTube before very long. In the mean time I will not be eating any Burnet moths... ;-)
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