[gillstevens]

Hi Alan
Thanks for your interest. The 'England only' focus is a consequence of our funding restrictions. The grant that supports the development of this and other OPAL projects is from the Big Lottery Fund Changing Spaces programme, which had a national focus.
As you saw from the online maps, results from outside England are welcomed, but of course, are terribly underrepresented, as we are not 'actively' promoting the work there. I really hope the resources that are being developed under this project will be useful to the wider UK audience, and as you will be aware, we are making the, freely downloadable. If you are interested in receiving a limited number of hard copies of the survey materials, let me know and I’ll see what I can do!
The lichen indicator species were selected through long consultation with the British Lichen Society and we are of course aware of their potential short-comings. We are looking for broad trends and although in an ideal world we would be asking for species records, asking non-specialists to distinguish between F. soredians and F. caperata might be a bit of a challenge….
The urban bias is the result of a combination of schools involvement and our network of regional centres all being based in large cities. We are also trying to encourage our highly urbanised population to get out and look at nature – part of the reason we have selected such accessible ‘biodiversity’.
Any help to redress the balance via WAB members, those who really get outside the concrete jungle, would be most welcome!
Best wishes
Gill