Dragonfly biodiversity 90 years ago in an Alpine region: The Odonata historical collection of the MUSE (Trento, Italy)

By

Assandri, Giacomo
Franceschini, Alessandra
Lencioni, Valeria 1970-

Type

Article

Date of Publication

2019-01-31

Original Publication

Biodiversity data journal

Volume

7

Pages

1--13

Subjects

Damselflies , Dragonflies , Italy , natural science museum , Trentino-Alto Adige

Contributed by

Pensoft Publishers

Language

English

Published by

Sofia Pensoft Publishers [2013]-

Identifiers

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3897/BDJ.7.e32391
eLocator: e32391

 

Abstract

Historical collections of natural science museums play a fundamental role in documenting environmental changes and patterns of biodiversity transformation. This considered, they should have a pivotal role to plan conservation and management actions.<br> The MUSE - Science Museum of Trento is an Italian regional museum preserving about 5.5 million items (organised in 297 collections). About one million of them are invertebrates, 70% of which are of local origin, gathered in the collection 'Miscellanea Invertebrati'. Odonata account for a minor part of this collection; however, most of them are of local or regional relevance. A complete catalogue of this collection does not exist to date.<br> The collection was studied in 2017-2018 and this contribution aims to present the Catalogue of the historic collection of Odonata of the MUSE - Museo delle Scienze of Trento (Italy).<br> In all, 836 specimens of adult dragonflies and damselflies are found in the collection referring to an overall 56 species. The collection covers a period between 1924 and 1957 and refer to 74 defined localities, all located in northern Italy (most of them in Trentino - Alto Adige Region).<br> The samples conserved in the collection are, for several species, the only indisputable confirmation of their former occurrence in that region.