Abstract

The UK is one of the most nature depleted countries in the world, with only 50% of its native biodiversity remaining, leading to an overall decline in UK ecosystems and genetic diversity. Genetic diversity is essential for evolution to occur and determines the capacity for populations to respond adaptively to a changing environment. Although recognised by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as a form of biodiversity, genetic diversity is often overlooked in conservation programmes due to lack of genetic data and difficulties in generating it. We have devised a framework which utilizes life history data as an alternative to genetic data to infer population genetics parameters which are used to inform conservation recommendations. Our framework combines approaches incorporating risk assessments predicting species population genetics parameters based on a combination of specific biological trait values and provides management recommendations to ensure conservation of genetic diversity. Here we apply our framework to the assessment of 52 UK native or archaeophyte plant species of conservation and ecological restoration interest. We found that species assessed as least likely to require conservation management were in line with the IUCN’s assessment of Least Concern species. This infers a level of agreement in the interpretation of life history trait values used in our framework. In the absence of genetic data, this framework proved to be very informative for conservation practitioners. However, further species-specific genetic analysis is still needed to confirm the results of this study and provide robust conservation management recommendations.