Plant communities on rock outcrops in the northwest part of the Black Sea Caucasian coast

Abstract

The classification of petrophytic vegetation of coastal steeps was proposed for the Northwest Cauca­sian coast of the Black Sea using the Braun-Blanquet approach. The main factors that influence the deve­lopment of vegetation in question are abrasion and denudation sea coast processes. The coastal steeps in study area are formed by carbonate flysch. The plant communities occur on rocky slopes with poorly deve­loped soil cover, fine stone chips as well as rock crevices. Nine associations and four communities without syntaxonomic rank were documented in the table and described with respect to their phyto­socio­logical affinities, ecology, and geographical location. Diagnostic species of syntaxa were established using phi-coefficient calculations of fidelity and Fisher’s exact test. In addition, the results of relevé ordination were given using the algorithm of non-metric multi­dimensional scaling (NMS) that is embedded in PC-ORD 5.0 software package.