Eyed Longhorn Beetle (Oberea oculata)
Key Details
| Taxonomic Groups: | Invertebrate > insect - beetle (Coleoptera) > Longhorn beetle |
| Red List Status: | Critically Endangered (Not Relevant) [CR(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: | Oberea oculata |
| UKSI Recommended Authority: | (Linnaeus, 1758) |
| UKSI Recommended Qualifier: | (none specified) |
| Red List Citation: | Alexander, 2019 |
| Notes on taxonomy/listing: | (none) |
Criteria
| Question 1: | Does species need conservation or recovery in England? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | Critically Endangered. Only recently recorded from a small patch of willow carr on the River Cam at Upware. It was recorded at Wicken Fen until 1983, and from other fenland sites in south-east England in the 19th century including in Oxfordshire (1819), at Romney Marsh (1883), and at The Hundred Foot Washes (1888). The population is severely fragmented and currently known from just one small and fragile location, with continuing decline projected in area of occupancy, and extent and quality of habitat. |
| Question 2: | Does recovery/ conservation depend on species-specific actions? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | While the threat from fenland drainage may now have receded, active management may be required to ensure continued availability of the healthy young shoots required for larval development. The Wicken Fen colony may have been lost through successional changes in the willow stands and a lack of active management targeted at the beetle. |
| 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: | No |
| Justification: | This species would not benefit from untargeted management |
Species Assessment
| Current step on the Species Recovery Curve (SRC): | 4. Autecology and pressures understood |
| Recovery potential/expectation: | Low - Relict or natural rarity |
| National Monitoring Resource: | Opportunistic - insufficient |
| Species Comments: | Eggs are laid on the smooth bark of twigs and slender stems of living healthy bushes, and the larva bores a straight gallery in the pith channel 30 cm or more in length, or in sapwood in wider stems (Duffy, 1953). The preferred host appears to be Salix spp., particularly Osier Salix viminalis. |
Key Actions
Key Action 1
Proposed Action: Research to characterise the ecology of the beetle, in terms of the size, condition, situation and management of host trees, and flower visits by adults
Action targets: 4. Autecology and pressures understood
Action type: Scientific research
Duration: 3-5 years
Scale of Implementation: 1 site
High priority sites: Sites redacted in final version due to sensitivities
Comments: Insufficient data are available to characterise the situation of occupied host bushes, the density of bushes in the vicinity, whether open-grown bushes or dense stands are preferred, age, or structure.
Key Action 2
Proposed Action: Search for the species at other historic locations, or potentially suitable sites near the River Cam at Upware. There is a risk of focusing all attention at one location when it could plausibly be found elsewhere.
Action targets: 2. Biological status assessment exists
Action type: Status survey/review
Duration: 3-5 years
Scale of Implementation: ≤ 5 sites
High priority sites: Sites redacted in final version due to sensitivities
Comments: Search for oviposition scars left by adult females on the branches of set diameter on the trees. This provides a low-intrusion measure of occupied trees and hence resource and a nice way of looking for it elsewhere.
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.