River Lamprey (Lampetra fluviatilis)
Key Details
| Taxonomic Groups: | Vertebrate > jawless fish (Agnatha) > Fish |
| Red List Status: | Least Concern (Not Relevant) [LC(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: | Lampetra fluviatilis |
| UKSI Recommended Authority: | (Linnaeus, 1758) |
| UKSI Recommended Qualifier: | (none specified) |
| Red List Citation: | Nunn et al., 2023 |
| Notes on taxonomy/listing: | (none) |
Criteria
| Question 1: | Does species need conservation or recovery in England? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | Population has undergone historic decline and current populations are likely to be impacted by pressures on river habitats, particularly barriers to migration. |
| Question 2: | Does recovery/ conservation depend on species-specific actions? |
| Response: | Yes |
| Justification: | Species is poorly represented in current monitoring programmes and historic fish passage solutions may not be suitable. This species is subject to a range of pressures including barriers to migration, water quality and exploitation. They also require bespoke monitoring programmes which are not currently in place and there are significant knowledge gaps in their ecology, such as an inability to differentiate between brook lamprey and river lamprey ammocoetes. If river lamprey is to achieve favourable conservation status, significant and often bespoke restoration actions will be required. |
| 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: | River lamprey need a mosaic of habitats in fresh water - gravel to spawn, sediment for ammocoetes, complex habitats (e.g., tree roots) as refugia for upstream migrating spawners. |
Species Assessment
| Current step on the Species Recovery Curve (SRC): | 2. Biological status assessment exists |
| Recovery potential/expectation: | Low - Combination or other (detail in comments) |
| National Monitoring Resource: | Combination - insufficient |
| Species Comments: | Impacted by barriers to migration, pollution & exploitation. The species specific nature of lamprey passage needs to be recognised so as not to preclude options for lampreys when implementing solutions for e.g., salmonids. Exploitation may be ending in 2025 but is currently unconfirmed. River lamprey are vulnerable to entrainment in abstractions (unless mitigated by screening), particularly during transformer and early marine stages. |
Key Actions
Key Action 1
Proposed Action: Undertake prioritised and targeted barrier removal or easement to deliver longitudinal connectivity across freshwater habitats and unhindered migratory passage for river lamprey.
Action targets: 7. Best approach adopted at appropriate scales
Action type: Pressure mitigation
Duration: 6-10 years
Scale of Implementation: National
High priority sites:
Comments:
Key Action 2
Proposed Action: Deliver suitable monitoring programmes and techniques to assess lamprey populations.
Action targets: 3. National Monitoring Plan agreed and implemented
Action type: Targeted monitoring
Duration: >10 years
Scale of Implementation: National
High priority sites:
Comments:
Key Action 3
Proposed Action: Undertake research to better understand lamprey ecology, particularly marine distribution of anadromous lampreys, and deliver new monitoring and restoration techniques.
Action targets: 4. Autecology and pressures understood
Action type: Scientific research
Duration: 2 years
Scale of Implementation: National
High priority sites:
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.