The French Saproxylic Beetle Database project: an ecological and taxonomical tool to help with the assessment of forest conservation status | La base de données sur les coléoptères saproxyliques français, un outil écologique et taxonomique pour l'évaluation de l'état de conservation des forêts

As soon as 1988, the Council of Europe exhorted European governments to use prioritarily the saproxylic organisms in the evaluation of forest conservation status (Recommendations R(88)10 and 11). About twenty years later, only a few tools are available to satisfy this objective. Beetles stand for the second dominating group in saproxylic assemblages (20% of the total number of species). Databases focusing on this taxon were consequently developed, but only in several European countries (Scandinavia: Dahlberg et Stokland, 2004; Great-Britain: Alexander, 2002 ; Germany: Köhler, 2000, Schmidl et Bussler, 2004, Müller et al., 2005). In France, the rich saproxylic beetle fauna (ca 2300 species) is only partly covered by these databases. The first national project was a list of 300 species written by Brustel (2001) as a pragmatic conservation tool. This pioneer initiative now suffers from a poor representativeness (i) in a taxonomical point of view (only a 6th of the species and 40% of the families are represented), and (ii) in an ecological perspective (only mid-size, large and remarkable species were included). Our current project aims at building a national and homogeneous information system. Three steps are planned and still in progress : 1.to draw a complete taxonomical table of saproxylic beetle French fauna, based on a corrected update of the FaunaEuropaea ; 2.to compile the available autecological data in predefined variables for each species (larval trophic regime, larval micro-habitat, relation to flowers, tree species preference) ; functional analyses of the relationship between ecological groups and local dead wood profiles may thus be carried out ; 3.to attribute a patrimonial value to each species (in agreement with the approach of Alexander, 1988 and Brustel, 2001), in order to assess the conservation status of stands, forests, reserves, etc.