engleski

Rocky grassland vegetation (Stipo-Festucetalia) of the Pannonian Basin and the Carpathian Mts – biogeographical patterns revealed by semi-supervised classification

Diversity of rocky grassland vegetation of Stipo pulcherrimae-Festucetalia pallentis was studied in the Pannonian Basin and the Carpathian Mts with the main aim to unify the syntaxonomical classification across ten countries. A joint database was established containing all grassland communities within the study area including 40 077 relevés: AT (4235), CZ (6798), HR (1138), HU (4626), PL (3343), RO (2008), RS (820), SI (1290), SK (15 501), UA (318). This large initial data set served as a source of relevés from which the target relevés were selected. Heterogeneityconstrained resampling with the number of selected relevés driven by beta-diversity was applied on the data selection. First, typical relevés of known associations of the Stipo-Festucetalia order were selected by the experts from each involved country and overlaps in the national classifications were indicated and discussed. Then, cores of new associations were searched by the K-means semi-supervised classification method. Distribution of the revised syntaxa showed a clear geographical pattern suggesting existence of geographically and ecologically well-differentiated communities with a specific floristic composition. Based on the obtained results, a new classification scheme was proposed for the Stipo-Festucetalia order in the studied region. Financial support was provided by VEGA 2/0099/13.

rocky grassland vegetation

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