May 2024
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The State of Nature Reports have been published since 2010 by Hamaarag. The reports present ecosystem trends and processes in Israel and provide a glimpse into the state of nature in Israel. The State of Nature Report 2023 – Biodiversity Volume is largely based on analyses of data accumulated during the first decade of the National Terrestrial Monitoring Program, operated by Hamaarag. The program encompasses most of Israel’s land territory, and spans 9 habitat-based monitoring units. The main monitoring questions address temporal changes in biodiversity and the effect of human settlements and agriculture on the ecosystems. A decade of monitoring encompassing 941 sampling plots has yielded much data, including 30,375 observations of medium-large sized mammals from 40 species, 68,141 birds from 195 species, 2,849 reptiles from 52 species, 267,579 butterflies from 92 species (over 13 years) and 20,365 plants from 139 species. The report also summarizes findings from additional sources: wildlife counts by the Israel Nature and Parks Authority (INPA), national monitoring programs for streams, the Sea of Galilee, the Mediterranean Sea, and the Red Sea, and the National Butterfly Monitoring Scheme, which is a citizen-science program.