Muskrat captures in Flanders, Belgium

Muskrat captures in Flanders, Belgium is an occurrence dataset published by the Research Institute for Nature and Forest (INBO). It contains information on all officially registered captures of muskrat (Ondatra zibethicus) in and around Flanders, Belgium between 1991 and 2018. These data are provided by different management actors: the Flanders Environment Agency (VMM), Rattenbestrijding Oost-Vlaanderen (RATO vzw), Polders and Wateringen (vvpw), and provincial and municipal trappers, and aggregated and analyzed by the INBO since 1991. Here it is published as a standardized Darwin Core Archive and includes for each occurrence record an occurrenceID, date, location, samplingProtocol (trap) and samplingEffort (number of days or traps), scientific name, and the organization who made the capture. The original dataset contains close to 450.000 occurrences and is available on GitHub, but only presence records (over 103.000) are included in this version, which can be used to track muskrat distribution in Flanders since 1991. Issues with the dataset can be reported at https://github.com/inbo/mica-occurrences/issues We have released this dataset to the public domain under a Creative Commons Zero waiver. We would appreciate it if you follow the INBO norms for data use (https://www.inbo.be/en/norms-data-use) when using the data. If you have any questions regarding this dataset, don't hesitate to contact us via the contact information provided in the metadata or via [email protected]. This dataset was published for the MICA project, which received funding from the European Union’s LIFE Environment sub-programme under the grant agreement LIFE18 NAT/NL/001047.