Millenial Status in Essex of Nationally Scarce and Threatened Species of Coleoptera 175
One species, Helophorus dorsalis, included in the previous account (Hammond, l.c.) was incorrectly
coded there as RDB3; this species is, in fact currently categorised as Nb, and is listed as such in
Table 2 below.
Nationally notable (scarce) beetle species in Essex
Of the approximately 4000 beetle species to be found in the British Isles, 761 are listed by Hyman &
Parsons (1992, 1994) in the higher scarcity/threat categories (RDB1 etc.), and 1041 listed as Nationally
notable (scarce) (i.e. Na, Nb or N). Approximately one quarter of the species in the higher categories
have been recorded at one time or another from Essex. Not surprisingly, a significantly greater
proportion, approximately 60%, of the lower status (Na etc.) species have been reliably reported
from the county. Essex data on these latter beetle species, 611 in all, and a few additional species for
which records are probably unreliable, are listed in Table 2. Date-class information is included in
this table but, because of the large number of species, this is limited to presence/absence of Essex
records; no indication is provided of the number or geogiaphical spread of records for each species
in a given period.
Table 2. Coleoptera species of Nationally Notable status recorded from the county of Essex.
Column 1: Current conservation status as listed by Hyman & Parsons (1992, 1994).
Column 2: Recorded from the vice-county of North Essex.
Column 3: Recorded from the vice-county of South Essex.
Column 4: Recorded from Essex pre-1900.
Column 5: Recorded from Essex 1900-1949.
Column 6: Recorded from Essex 1950-1969.
Column 7: Recorded from Essex post-1969.
Categories listed in column 1 are: Na = Nationally Notable A; Nb = Nationally Notable B; N =
Nationally Notable (unclassified).
In columns 2 and 3 prc-1970 records arc indicated by + and post-1969 records by *.
Square brackets indicate species for which the available Essex records are particularly doubtful.
Carabidae
Cicindela maritima Latreille & Dejean
Cicindela sylvatica Linnaeus
Carabus monilis Fabricius
Calosoma inquisitor (Linnaeus)
Notiophilus quadripunctatus Dejean
Blethisa multipunctata (Linnaeus)
Dyschirius nitidus (Dejean) Na
Essex Naturalist (New Series) 17 (2000)