Lichen Diversity in Portland Metro Area

Lichens are keystone species ubiquitous around the world. Lichens are important air quality indicators across urban and natural ecosystems. The biodiversity of lichens can be great, but as species sensitive to air-pollution, the biodiversity in urban ecosystems does not always match the biodiversity of surrounding natural areas. For this work I used the citizen science tool iNaturalist to compile a list of the most frequently observed lichen species in the Portland-Vancouver Metro Region. Public tools like iNaturalist make lichen surveys accessible to more people. I present details about how to identify the five most frequently observed lichen species, and summary statistics about the twenty most observed species which span 11 fungal families. Parmeliaceae is by far the most common family representing 7 of the top 20 observed lichen species (35%), with Hypogymnia representing the genus of the most species (3 of 20). The most frequent type of thallus (lichen body) is foliose, representing 60% of the top observed species. I will give a brief overview of lichen biology and their ecology. Becoming familiar with lichens is the first step to promoting the conservation of these important organisms. The persistent nature of lichens enables the study of these organisms in any season. I aim to show that anyone can be a lichenologist.