Extent of Sampling Effort of the Romanian Centipedes (Myriapoda: Chilopoda): Issues and Advances

Over a century and a half of research, 112 valid species of centipedes have been recorded in Romania but data have resulted from studies on limited territories or specific habitats. We evaluated the currently known extent of the sampling effort for centipede species. A database with 2627 locations for every recorded species was generated and processed in geographic information system (GIS) using the 10 km EEA grid resolution with 2550 grid cells corresponding to Romanian territory. Only 451 of them had data, mostly (75.83%) with less than six species. The spatial statistical analysis validated the supposition of a strongly biased sampling for Romania and highlighted the hotspots of increased sampling efforts. Most hotspots were in the western half of the country and in Dobrogea, overlapping with the Romanian karst areas, while the greatest part of the eastern half was less studied. The grid cells with the highest Z scores, between 6.4 and 12.13, were all located in South-Western Romania corresponding to three ecoregions.