**5. Conclusions**

The main highlights of our study can be summarized as follows:


Although our findings only partially support the hypotheses formulated in the study, we believe that they may provide new insights into the interpretation of the ecology of lichen species in Mediterranean forest ecosystems.

**Supplementary Materials:** The following are available online at https://www.mdpi.com/1999-4 907/12/1/27/s1, Table S1: Distribution of the sampled tree species in old-growth (OG) and Non old-growth (NO) stands. Table S2: List of the 148 lichen species found on the 106 sampled trees, with their occurrence (number and percentage of plots).

**Author Contributions:** Conceptualization, G.B., L.F. and P.G.; methodology, L.F., P.G.; formal analysis, L.F. and P.G.; investigation, G.B., S.R.; resources, G.B., S.R.; data curation, L.F. and G.B.; writing original draft preparation, G.B., L.F., S.R. and P.G.; writing—review and editing, G.B., L.F., S.R. and P.G. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

**Funding:** Funding for field sampling was provided by the Cilento and Vallo di Diano National Park and is part of the project "Monitoraggio alla rete dei boschi vetusti del Parco nazionale del Cilento e Vallo di Diano" with the coordination of the Department of Plant Biology of "La Sapienza" University, Rome.

**Institutional Review Board Statement:** Not applicable.

**Informed Consent Statement:** Not applicable.

**Data Availability Statement:** The data presented in this study are available on request from the corresponding author.

**Acknowledgments:** We thank the three reviewers for useful suggestions that helped to improve this paper.

**Conflicts of Interest:** The authors declare no conflict of interest.
