The conservation of biological diversity is a foundation of ecologically sustainable management. To assess sustainability with regard to biodiversity conservation, forest managers are using forest type as a surrogate for ecosystem and species diversity. This paper investigates the applicability of this approach for invertebrate conservation in managed forests. As invertebrates comprise the bulk of the biodiversity in these systems it is important that they are effectively incorporated into any proposed reporting scheme. This research shows that specific forest types and their growth stages do not support characteristic arthropod assemblages and that composition of terrestrial arthropod communities is related to the structure and disturbance history of the ground layer.