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Milovice Reserve emerges as one of Europe’s richest moth habitats – EnviroNews
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An innovative biodiversity monitoring project has identified the former Milovice military training area, outside Prague in the Czech Republic, as one of Europe’s richest habitats for moths, with preliminary findings also revealing considerable bird diversity.
The findings, generated through automated biodiversity monitoring stations powered by artificial intelligence (AI), highlight the ecological importance of the former military site, which is now home to a large herbivore reserve popularly known as the European Serengeti.
Over the past two years, researchers have installed three automated monitoring stations across the area. Two are located within the large ungulate reserve, while the third is situated near the local wastewater treatment plant and adjoining wetlands.
Preliminary analysis indicates that all three locations rank among the most species-rich sites surveyed across Europe for moths.
Jonas Gaigr, a zoologist in the Department for Monitoring the Status of Animal Species at the Nature Conservation Agency, said the findings demonstrate the exceptional biodiversity of the Milovice landscape.
The monitoring exercise is being conducted under the European Biodiversa+ project through the Automated Biodiversity Monitoring Stations (ABMS) pilot research programme, which also covered sites in 11 other European Union member states over the past two years.
Although the preliminary results generated through artificial intelligence models are encouraging, Gaigr explained that the data are still awaiting expert validation by entomologists from the Nature Conservation Agency before being incorporated into the agency’s Nature Conservation Findings Database.
Beyond moths, the monitoring stations have also revealed significant bird diversity across the reserve.
According to Gaigr, automated detectors identified 29 bird species in open countryside habitats and 41 species along the forest edge.
He noted that the actual number of species is expected to be considerably higher, as the automated system adopts a conservative identification approach, listing species only when there are sufficient recordings to support a reliable identification.
Additional recordings that the algorithm could not conclusively classify are awaiting verification by ornithologists.
Among the birds frequently recorded in the area are the European bee-eater, which hunts over the reserve’s pastures, and the common chiffchaff, which is particularly prevalent along the forest edge.
Gaigr added that 146 bird species had been recorded across the entire Mladá National Natural Monument in the Nature Conservation Findings Database over the past decade, including migratory species occasionally observed in the area, such as the ring ouzel.
Against this background, he described the detection of at least 41 species at a single monitoring location as a significant finding, even when assessed against the system’s conservative identification criteria.
The findings have reinforced calls for the protection of the former military training area, whose ecological significance has long been recognised by conservation scientists.
Dalibor Dostal, director of the conservation organisation European Wildlife, which established the large herbivore reserve in 2015 in collaboration with scientists, said research confirming the area’s exceptional biodiversity was important for securing its future.
He noted that scientists had consistently identified the former military grounds as an area of considerable biological importance, at least within Central Europe.
According to Dostal, further scientific evidence of its ecological value would strengthen efforts to preserve the unique landscape and its wildlife for future generations.
The automated monitoring technology is also attracting attention for offering a less intrusive and more sustainable approach to biodiversity research.
Unlike conventional monitoring methods, the stations operate without requiring scientists to be physically present throughout the observation period and are designed to be energy self-sufficient.
For moth monitoring, the system uses ultraviolet light to attract nocturnal insects onto a white surface, where cameras continuously photograph them.
An AI-powered system subsequently analyses the images, progressively improving its ability to identify different insect groups and individual moth species.
The approach eliminates the need for traditional collection methods that involve killing moths in toxic solutions and identifying them from dead specimens.
Bird monitoring is conducted through recording equipment that captures bird calls, allowing the system to identify species from their vocalisations.
Researchers believe the technology could significantly improve biodiversity monitoring by enabling continuous observation of wildlife across different habitats while reducing disturbance to the species being studied.
The preliminary findings from Milovice demonstrate how emerging technologies can help uncover biodiversity patterns and provide additional scientific evidence for protecting ecologically important landscapes.
