Ground-pine (Ajuga chamaepitys)
Key Details
| Taxonomic Groups: | Vascular plant > flowering plant > Herbaceous plant |
| Red List Status: | Endangered (Not Relevant) [EN(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: | Ajuga chamaepitys |
| UKSI Recommended Authority: | (L.) Schreb. |
| UKSI Recommended Qualifier: | (none specified) |
| Red List Citation: | in Stroh et al., 2014 |
| Notes on taxonomy/listing: | (none) |
Criteria
| Question 1: | Does species need conservation or recovery in England? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | Most recent atlas data shows no reversal of historic major declines in Area of Occupancy and Extent of Occurrence. |
| Question 2: | Does recovery/ conservation depend on species-specific actions? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | Germination of seed which is long lived, and therefore renewal of the seed-bank (annual or shortlived perennial), is dependent on ground disturbance. It may be that seed is often relatively deeply buried, due to long periods without sufficient disturbance, so that surface scarification may not be sufficient, though the plant does occur on land heavily disturbed by rabbits. |
| 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: | In landscapes where the plant has historically occurred, periodic and severe disturbance of grassland and/or scrub to reset succession may be beneficial. |
Species Assessment
| Current step on the Species Recovery Curve (SRC): | 5. Remedial action identified |
| Recovery potential/expectation: | Medium-high |
| National Monitoring Resource: | Opportunistic - insufficient |
| Species Comments: | Monitoring should be associated with tracking the success of targeted land management activities |
Key Actions
Key Action 1
Proposed Action: Establish a database of all current or recent sites, to include known population size/extent, history and management.
Action targets: 5. Remedial action identified
Action type: Status survey/review
Duration: 2 years
Scale of Implementation: ≤ 50 sites
High priority sites:
Comments: Essential precursor to targeting management.
Key Action 2
Proposed Action: Ensure that all sites with recent counts of >10 plants are subject to management believed likely to maintain and increase the population.
Action targets: 5. Remedial action identified
Action type: Habitat management
Duration: 3-5 years
Scale of Implementation: ≤ 50 sites
High priority sites:
Comments: Management may include regular/intermittent management of field margins where the species occurs on arable land, rotational heavy grazing, encouragement of rabbits, or other measures that create regular or periodic turnover of the soil surface. Note that annual presence of plants is not necessarily desirable, so long as there is a long-term trend of populations maintenance or increase.
Key Action 3
Proposed Action: Implement a programme to restore a series of historic populations through targeted ground disturbance.
Action targets: 5. Remedial action identified
Action type: Habitat creation
Duration: 3-5 years
Scale of Implementation: ≤ 10 sites
High priority sites:
Comments: Target sites should be in 'ground-pine' landscapes close to sites being effectively managed under Action 1.
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.