Peter Lambley MBE graduated from Leicester University in Botany and worked for 15 years for Norfolk Museums Service before going abroad to work at The University of Papua New Guinea in Port Moresby. He stayed there for 4 years before returning to England. From 1989 until 2006 he worked as a Conservation Officer for English Nature in Norfolk but was also the lichen specialist for English Nature. His interest in lichens goes back a long way but an early excursion with Dr Francis Rose to Sotterley Park in Suffolk inspired him to start studying them seriously. He has been BLS Assistant Treasurer and more recently Bulletin editor.

Stephen Ward graduated from the Bangor University in botany. His doctorate on heathland ecology was gained at Aberdeen. He devoted his career to nature conservation, being proud to have worked in the Nature Conservancy, ITE and Scottish Natural Heritage. Achievements [always as part of a team] included a vegetation map of Dartmoor, a definitive study of limestone pavements, work on Anglesey and the Lleyn Peninsula to conserve SSSIs, notifying SSSIs in NE England, and latterly going back to his rhizines with a remit to represent the best interests of lower plants and fungi in Scotland – largely as an MP might do – knowing few of them personally, but fighting for their welfare.

Pat Wolseley is a botanist who started to work on lichens in 1979. She became a Leverhulme Fellow at the Natural History Museum in 1990, working on lichens as indicators of environmental conditions in Thailand. She has also worked in Malaysia, Kalimantan and more recently Sri Lanka. In the UK, working with CEH, she has developed methods of assessing impacts of ammonia on lichens. She is a Scientific Associate at the Natural History Museum and runs courses on lichens for the Field Studies Council. She was secretary of the British Lichen Society from 2000 - 2006.