www.blommar.nu

Changes in flowering time, bird migration, butterfly emergence, harvesting dates etc. are among the best biological indicators of climate change (Parmesen 2006). Together, spare time as well as professional botanists have produced several large and long term data sets and often these have been used to estimate the amount of these changes. Sweden holds great historical data sets on phenology (I used one in a 2008 Oikos paper.), including unique examples as the 73 year long data set on flowering time for 25 species compiled by Gunnar Johansson in Uppland, Sweden (An overview of his data.)
 
The www.blommar.nu project will allow anybody interested in monitoring seasonal events to report these data into a database useful for both climate change management, teaching and science. This project is part of the effort to initiate a national phenology network in Sweden. 

An important concern in research about ecosystem change due
to climate change is that organisms respond differently to changing conditions. Some may track climate change perfectly while others don’t. Not only does this affect our possibilities to predict ecosystem change, it may also create mismatches in the interactions between organisms (e.g. food chains in aquatic ecosystems; plant-pollinator interactions). Therefore it is relevant to collect data from a wide variety of species and organisms.
 
Initially, the www.blommar.nu project will focus on plant phenology (dates of leafing, flowering, fruit ripening, leaf colouring and leaf shedding). The goal is to create a database where we can follow long-term changes in our ecosystems for a large diversity of species and over large geographic areas.


Kjell Bolmgren
PhD
  
E-mail:
kjell.bolmgren/at/slu.se
kjell.bolmgren/at/biol.lu.se
  
 
Postal and Visiting Address:
c/o Department of Botany
Stockholm University
SE-106 91 Stockholm
 SWEDEN