Mire Pill Beetle (Curimopsis nigrita)
Key Details
| Taxonomic Groups: | Invertebrate > insect - beetle (Coleoptera) > Pill beetle or ally |
| 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: | Curimopsis nigrita |
| UKSI Recommended Authority: | (Palm, 1934) |
| UKSI Recommended Qualifier: | (none specified) |
| Red List Citation: | Lane, 2021 |
| Notes on taxonomy/listing: | (none) |
Criteria
| Question 1: | Does species need conservation or recovery in England? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | Critically Endangered. The species was first discovered in Britain at Thorne Moors in 1977 and is confined to this site, and the contiguous Crowle Moor and Hatfield Moors in south-west Yorkshire/North Lincolnshire. It has also been recorded at Haxey Grange Fen in North Lincolnshire but may have been lost from this site. |
| Question 2: | Does recovery/ conservation depend on species-specific actions? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | The species has persisted despite peat extraction though it is unclear how it responds to vegetation succession and rewetting. |
| 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: | Curimopsis nigrita feeds on acrocarpous mosses and algae, specifically Dicranella cerviculata, Dicranella heteromalla and Campylopus pyriformis. |
Key Actions
Key Action 1
Proposed Action: Autecological research to better characterise habitat requirements and inform management, using standardised methodology to establish baseline for national monitoring programme
Action targets: 4. Autecology and pressures understood
Action type: Scientific research
Duration: 3-5 years
Scale of Implementation: ≤ 5 sites
High priority sites: Thorne Moors, Crowle Moor, and Hatfield Moor
Comments: Curimopsis nigrita was the subject of research sampling in the 1990s although there has been no standardised or regular-frequency monitoring.
Key Action 2
Proposed Action: Resurvey Haxey Grange Fen in North Lincolnshire
Action targets: 3. National Monitoring Plan agreed and implemented
Action type: Status survey/review
Duration: 3-5 years
Scale of Implementation: 1 site
High priority sites: Haxey Grange Fen in North Lincolnshire
Comments: Checking latest NE surveys at Haxey Grange Fen - not found despite thorough survey in 2009.
Key Action 3
Proposed Action: Ensure appropriate habitat management is implemented at all occupied sites. This should be based on the results of Actions 1 and 2, and is likely to include scrub control.
Action targets: 7. Best approach adopted at appropriate scales
Action type: Habitat management
Duration: >10 years
Scale of Implementation: ≤ 5 sites
High priority sites: Thorne Moors, Crowle Moor, and Hatfield Moor
Comments:
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.