Summer is here and the about 165 plant species and over 1000 invertebrate species are in full activity in the short and somewhat cold High Arctic summer season. If you stumble over a flower or an insect you don’t recognize, there are two websites that can help you in identifying your find: Svalbardflora.net and SPIDER.

Text: Eva Therese Jenssen

Despite the harsh climate and chilly and short summer, there is an amazing amount of life in Svalbard in these months. In addition to the birds, mammals and fish, there is about 165 plant species and more than 1000 invertebrate species living in the archipelago.

Enjoying the outdoors, you can observe the many different species, but it might be hard to identify that particular plant or insect. Now you have the aid of two web-based databases developed by UNIS scientists.

The flora of Svalbard
The Svalbardflora.net has existed for a few years and is managed by UNIS adjunct associate professor Inger Greve Alsos. The goal of this web site is to present a complete flora with excellent photo documentation of the plant species in Svalbard.

The work started in spring 2007 and information and photos have been published steadily since then. The website has alphabetical lists with pictures of the Svalbard flora, with Latin, English and Norwegian names, distribution map and other scientific data pertaining to the particular species.

This website can help you identify and learn more about the plants in this High Arctic archipelago. Just remember: help take care of the biodiversity and do not pick flowers in Svalbard.

Flora and invertebrates: Plant lice feeding on a Mountain Avens (Dryas octopetala) in Longyearbyen. (Photo: Steve Coulson).

Creepy-crawlies
There are over 1000 species of terrestrial or freshwater invertebrate in Svalbard, including 230 species of insect and 19 species of spider. Invertebrate is a general term for all animals without backbones, and includes those with hard bodies, for example insects, and those with soft bodies, such as worms.

On Svalbard these animals draw little attention often being small, hidden away and not readily visible. Nonetheless, they perform many important ecosystem functions, for example involved in organic soil formation processes, nutrient cycling and pollination not to mention their own complex food webs.

The Svalbard Photographic Invertebrate Database and Educational Resource (SPIDER) aims at providing information about the invertebrates in Svalbard, answering questions such as, what is here in Svalbard, how did it get here and how does it survive. SPIDER project manager is Steve Coulson, associate professor at UNIS.

Both databases have received financial support from the Svalbard Environmental Protection Fund.

The Svalbard Photographic Invertebrate Database and Educational Resource (SPIDER) website.