The FAIR-Device - a non-lethal and generalist semi-automatic Malaise trap for insect biodiversity monitoring: Proof of concept
Field monitoring plays a crucial role in understanding insect dynamics within ecosystems. It facilitates pest distribution assessment, control measure evaluation, and prediction of pest outbreaks. Additionally, it provides important information on bioindicators with which the state of biodiversity and ecological integrity in specific habitats and ecosystems can be accurately assessed. However, traditional monitoring systems can present various difficulties, leading to a limited temporal and spatial resolution of the obtained information. Despite recent advancements in automatic insect monitoring traps, also called e-traps, most of these systems focus exclusively on studying agricultural pests, rendering them unsuitable for monitoring diverse insect populations. To address this issue, we introduce the Field Automatic Insect Recognition (FAIR)-Device, a novel non-lethal field tool that relies on semi-automatic image capture and species identification using artificial intelligence via the iNaturalist platform. Our objective was to develop an automatic, cost-effective, and non-specific monitoring solution capable of providing high-resolution data for assessing insect diversity. During a 26-day proof-of-concept evaluation, the FAIR-Device recorded 24.8 GB of video, identifying 431 individuals from 9 orders, 50 families, and 69 genera. While improvements are possible, our device demonstrated potential as a cost-effective, non-lethal tool for monitoring insect biodiversity. Looking ahead, we envision new monitoring systems such as e-traps as valuable tools for real-time insect monitoring, offering unprecedented insights for ecological research and agricultural practices.