Diversity and regeneration strategies in woody plant communities of the Mediterranean Basin: Vegetation type matters

Abstract

The Mediterranean Basin has distinct vegetation types shaped by fire, herbivory, and various human activities. Based on data from 83 belt transects of 10 × 40 m in 28 study sites for five physiognomic vegetation types (semi-closed forest, open forest, closed shrubland, open shrubland, and scrubland) in southwestern Anatolia (Turkey), we analyzed woody species diversity, woody community composition, and vegetation structure of study sites. We used the growth form and regeneration strategy for functional comparisons of physiognomic vegetation types. We found clear distinctions in diversity, species composition, and functional structure of woody plant community across five physiognomic vegetation types. The forest-shrubland-scrubland distinction was the most apparent one. Despite similarities in the woody species richness and Shannon diversity, open and closed vegetation states of forests and shrublands also differed regarding the density and cover of mature individuals and the density of saplings in different functional groups. Non-metric multidimensional scaling analyses and indicator species analyses also indicated clear distinctions among physiognomic vegetation types and openness states. Our findings indicate the necessity of a more complex description of vegetation types in the Mediterranean Basin. The results suggest that open and closed vegetation states of forests and shrublands are functionally distinct vegetation types.

Supplemental data for this article is available online at https://doi.org/10.1080/11263504.2022.2036845.

Keywords:

• Pinus brutia forest
• open vegetation
• woody plant community
• regeneration strategies
• scrubland
• shrubland
• the Mediterranean Basin
• NMDS
• indicator species analysis

Acknowledgments

We are grateful to many people voluntarily joined our fieldwork (Metin Tüfekcioğlu, Metin İlke Özcan, Elif Naz Duman, Bora Karataş, Umut Hasanoğlu, Pınar Maktav, Cihan Ünal Değirmenci, İrem Melike Güler, Ezgi Gökçe, Pınar Kütküt, Rüveyda Zehra Öğütverici, Alper Acar, Zeynep Ladin Çoşgun, Halime Tüfekcioğlu, Seda Tüfekcioğlu, and Senem Tüfekcioğlu), Haşim Altınözlü and Mecit Vural for their help in identifying plant species, C. Can Bilgin and Cumhur Güngöroğlu for their suggestions on the vegetation type classification, and Ozan Bulum for his support in R codes. We also thank the General Directorate of Forestry (Turkey), Muğla Regional Directorate of Forestry, and Köyceğiz, Datça, Hisarönü, Çetibeli, and Bayır Forest Management Units for their technical support. This study is a part of the Ph.D. dissertation of the first author (Institute of Science, Hacettepe University, Turkey).

Author contributions

Ç.T. conceived the idea and designed the research; İ.T. performed field studies with the contribution from Ç.T.; İ.T. conducted the data entry and management; İ.T. and Ç.T. performed statistical analyses and wrote the paper.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was funded by the Rufford Foundation under Grant no 28128-1; Nature Conservation Centre (Ankara, Turkey); the Functional Ecology Laboratory, Hacettepe University (Ankara, Turkey).