Dataset of urban butterfly metacommunities and floral richness in Ottawa, Canada

This dataset includes butterfly observation data within three butterfly metacommunities, comprising 10 sites each, in urban and peri-urban Ottawa, Canada. One metacommunity was set in the peri-urban naturalized Ottawa Greenbelt, and the others in three increasingly urban neighbourhoods: Centrepointe, Westboro, and Sandy Hill. Observations were collected during the summer of 2022. It includes floral richness at each site. It contains data on site size, location, and the amount of impervious surface area within a 250m buffer zone around each site., Please see the scientific article associated with this dataset for full methods., , # Dataset of urban butterfly metacommunities and floral richness. Ottawa, Canada.

[https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.z34tmpgpq](https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.z34tmpgpq)

## Description of the data and file structure

This data was collected for an analysis of the drivers of alpha and beta diversity within and among increasingly urban butterfly metacommunities.
### Files and variables

#### File: Butterfly\_Observations.xls

**Description:** All butterfly observations.

##### Variables

* site_ID: the name of each unique site.
* metacommunity: the name of the area in which each of the four metacommunities were located.
* All other columns are the number of individuals of a given species observed at a site.

#### File: Site\_Characteristics.xls

**Description:** 

##### Variables

* site_ID: the name of each unique site.
* metacommunity: the name of the area in which each of the four metacommunities were located.
* longitude: the longitude of each site.
* latitude: the latitude of each site....,