Arthonia invadens
Key Details
| Taxonomic Groups: | Fungus or lichen > fungus > Lichenicolous fungus |
| Red List Status: | Near Threatened (Not Relevant) [NT(nr)] |
| D5 Status: | Included in the baseline Red List Index for England (Wilkins, Wilson & Brown, 2022) |
| Section 41 Status: | (not listed) |
| Taxa Included Synonym: | (none) |
| UKSI Recommended Name: | Arthonia invadens |
| UKSI Recommended Authority: | Coppins |
| UKSI Recommended Qualifier: | (none specified) |
| Red List Citation: | Woods & Coppins, 2012 |
| Notes on taxonomy/listing: | (none) |
Criteria
| Question 1: | Does species need conservation or recovery in England? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | A rare species endemic to GB & Ireland. Stronghold in S.W. England and New Forest. |
| Question 2: | Does recovery/ conservation depend on species-specific actions? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | A specialist dependant on populations of its host (Schizotrema quercicola) in old growth woodlands. Key evidence gaps exist concerning its current status, threats and remedial measures. |
| Question 3: | At a landscape scale, would the species benefit from untargeted habitat management to increase habitat mosaics, structural diversity, or particular successional stages? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | The host will respond well to bringing extensive oceanic woodlands into good condition, especially restoring sustainable grazing and maintaining a gladed structure. |
Species Assessment
| Current step on the Species Recovery Curve (SRC): | 4. Autecology and pressures understood |
| Recovery potential/expectation: | Medium-high |
| National Monitoring Resource: | Opportunistic - insufficient |
| Species Comments: | Healthy populations require extensively grazed minimum intervention pasture woodland, restoring grazing to woodlands is difficult and opposed by some policies. Dependant on large populations of its host (Schizotrema quercicola) in old growth woodlands, but there are known threats to both species from increasing shade in woodland due to e.g. expansion of holly. |
Key Actions
Key Action 1
Proposed Action: Produce a species dossier to collate information on current and historic sites, including results of surveys and assessment of threats and remedial actions
Action targets: 4. Autecology and pressures understood
Action type: Scientific research
Duration: 1 year
Scale of Implementation: ≤ 50 sites
High priority sites:
Comments: Positive impacts on many threatened lichen species. Potential to bundle this with other grazing dependant woodland species.
Key Action 2
Proposed Action: Advise and support site owners and managers to implement the site-level actions identifies in A1
Action targets: 7. Best approach adopted at appropriate scales
Action type: Advice & support
Duration: 6-10 years
Scale of Implementation: ≤ 50 sites
High priority sites:
Comments: Positive impacts on many threatened lichen species. Potential to bundle this with other grazing dependant woodland species.
Acknowledgment:
Data used on this website are adapted from Threatened species recovery actions 2025 baseline (JP065): Technical report and spreadsheet user guide (Natural England, 2025). Available here.