An overview of the current conservation statusof 3,769 invertebrates, some 10% of the total number of terrestrial and freshwater invertebrate species found in Britain. A rolling programme of status reviews is recommended.
The first review of the conservation status of the British invertebrate fauna was published nearly 30 years ago in two ‘British Red Data Book’ volumes (Shirt 1987; Bratton 1991). It used a status classification which combined threat and distribution, which, while gaining widespread use within Britain, failed to be adopted elsewhere.