Biogeographic status of the steppe plains and foothills of the northern and western Caspian lowland

Abstract

Abstract The discussion focuses on the zonal nature of the Caspian steppe and the status of the local biota, which in its spatial-temporal organization and regional succession system has preserved the pool of biodiversity of dry-steppe and desert complexes. Each of them represents a set of ancient systematic groups of organisms that migrated here along both the Eastern (Turan) and Western (Caucasus, Mediterranean) coasts of the Caspian Sea, forming “young” lowland ecosystems. There is a weak significance in the Genesis of the biota of the xerophilic foothills of the Eastern Caucasus (Daghestan) and the southern Urals, which, apparently, only at the early stages of formation during periods of major sea transgressions served as refugia. The phylocenogenetically determined polyclimax and the predominance of pasqual and climatogenic subclimaxes in the region are manifested due to constant impact of cyclical short-term (hundreds of years) destabilizing factors.