Biodiversity monitoring programs and citizen science data remain heavily biased toward the Global North. Especially in megadiverse countries with limited biodiversity records, incorporating social media data can help address existing data gaps. However, whether such data can significantly improve our understanding of range‐shifting species is still unknown. We tested whether social media data improved our knowledge of the rang...

The gap between the number of described species and the number of species that actually exist is known as the Linnean shortfall and is of fundamental importance for biogeography and conservation. Unsurprisingly, there have been many attempts to quantify its extent for different taxa and regions. In this Perspective , we argue that such forecasts remain highly problematic because the extent of the shortfall does depend not only...

Aim Insects are one of the least studied taxa, with most species lacking basic ecological and biogeographical information. This problem is particularly acute in the tropics, where low sampling effort hampers accurate estimates of species richness at scale and potentially confounds efforts to identify the drivers of biogeographical gradients. Here, we evaluate the quality of the data on the distribution and diversity of odonate...

Islands are biodiversity hotspots that host unique assemblages. However, a substantial proportion of island species are threatened and their long‐term survival is uncertain. Identifying and preserving vulnerable species has become a priority, but it is also essential to combine this information with other facets of biodiversity like functional diversity, to understand how future extinctions might affect ecosystem stability and...

Citizen science plays a crucial role in helping monitor biodiversity and inform conservation. With the widespread use of smartphones, many people share biodiversity information on social media, but this information is still not widely used in conservation. Focusing on Bangladesh, a tropical megadiverse and mega‐populated country, we examined the importance of social media records in conservation decision‐making. We collated sp...

Driscoll et al. ( Journal of Biogeography , 2019, 46, 2850–2859) provide a critique of ‘Countryside Biogeography’, but also include ‘Conservation Biogeography’ and ‘Agriculture Biogeography’ in their criticisms. Their main thesis is that these new sub‐disciplines offer a ‘conceptual wrapper’ rather than distinctive frameworks and that the consequent redundancy of terms has the potential to sow confusion among biogeographers an...

Aim Spatial and temporal biases in species‐occurrence data can compromise broad‐scale biogeographical research and conservation planning. Although spatial biases have been frequently scrutinized, temporal biases and the overall quality of species‐occurrence data have received far less attention. This study aims to answer three questions: (1) How reliable are species‐occurrence data for flowering plants in Africa? (2) Where and...

Sustainable intensification of agriculture is one of the main strategies to provide global food security. However, its implementation raises enormous political, technological, and social challenges. Meeting these challenges will require, among other things, accurate information on the spatial and temporal patterns of agricultural land use and yield. Here, we investigate historical patterns of agricultural land use (1940–2012)...

In a recent editorial, Whittaker (2014, Journal of Biogeography , 41 , 1–5) suggested that biogeography is in the process of adopting a ‘big science’ model, characterized by increasing levels of individual specialization and international collaboration. Using network analysis based on co‐authored articles and bibliometrics, we trace this transformation, identifying where biogeographical knowledge is produced and how the global...