Anthophagus alpinus
Key Details
| Taxonomic Groups: | Invertebrate > insect - beetle (Coleoptera) > Rove beetle (macrostaph) |
| 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: | Anthophagus alpinus |
| UKSI Recommended Authority: | (Paykull, 1790) |
| UKSI Recommended Qualifier: | (none specified) |
| Red List Citation: | Boyce, 2022 |
| Notes on taxonomy/listing: | (none) |
Criteria
| Question 1: | Does species need conservation or recovery in England? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | This species is a montane habitat specialist and has apparently declined significantly in AoO since 1980. Ongoing declines in suitability of available habitat are partially climatic but also due to overgrazing by sheep and deer. Conservation will depend on management intervention. |
| Question 2: | Does recovery/ conservation depend on species-specific actions? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | Species conservation depends on maintaining montane herb-rich habitats, a high-value habitat in itself. Appropriate management will benefit the entire suite of montane species associated with this habitat. |
| 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: | Sympathetic management of montane herb-rich habitats through protection from overgrazing is likely to benefit populations of this species. |
Species Assessment
| Current step on the Species Recovery Curve (SRC): | 5. Remedial action identified |
| Recovery potential/expectation: | Low - Climate change |
| National Monitoring Resource: | Opportunistic - insufficient |
| Species Comments: | Conservation of existing populations will be helped by reducing grazing pressure on known sites but, as a montane specialist, climate change makes any recovery unlikely and, in the longer term, is likely to push England outside the suitable climatic envelope for the species. |
Key Actions
Key Action 1
Proposed Action: Assess grazing pressures on known sites and, if considered to be detrimental to the condition of montane herb-rich habitats, reduce pressure through exclusion (e.g. fencing), reducing stocking pressure or culling excessively large deer populations.
Action targets: 5. Remedial action identified
Action type: Habitat management
Duration: 3-5 years
Scale of Implementation: ≤ 20 sites
High priority sites: Ingleborough and Pen-y-Ghent in the Dales [both Mid-west Yorkshire (vc64)]; Beckhouse, Fairfield, Helvellyn, High Crag, Red Screes and Skiddaw in the Lake District [Westmorland (vc69) and Cumberland (vc70)]; Cross Fell, Cumberland (vc70)
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.