Vascular Plants Distribution as a Tool for Adaptive Forest Management of Floodplain Forests in the Dyje River Basin

Abstract

The study is based on a full floristic inventory of floodplain forests in South Moravia along the upper part of the Dyje River (Forest district Valtice). The study area is located in the Dolní Morava Biosphere Reserve and includes several Sites of Community Importance within Natura 2000. The aim of the inventory was to analyze diversity of herb and woody species occuring in the study area, including both native protected and threatened species, and invasive species. The study area was divided into segments. A segment represented the smallest unit of spatial forest division -"forest stand part". The species were recorded into a special scratch-list. Altogether, 656 plant species were found. The floristic database has been integrated with GIS. Maps of distribution of selected plant species or groups of plants were produced. On the basis of geographical visualization of the above mentioned results we identified areas with a high diversity of all species and endangered species. The results may be used as a base for adaptive forest and environmental management.

Vascular Plant Biodiversity of Floodplain Forest in Morava and Dyje Rivers Confluence (Forest District Soutok), Czech Republic

“…Man-made natural ecosystems sensu van Maarel (1975) were established this way, forests developed under influence of both, human activities and natural processes. Key human interventions supporting the high level of biodiversity are (i) using of habitat-original tree species (mainly oak, ash and elm) for reforestation, especially oak regeneration is problematic without artificial reforestation (Libus et al, 2010) (ii) diversification of age structure of forests (Řepka & Maděra, 2009b) document that young developmental stages of forests host high diversity), (iii) creation of forest edges as a habitat with high diversity and many endangered plant species (Maděra et al, 2011), (iv) maintenance of water channels bringing water inside the floodplain forests after rivers have been regulated (Vybíral & Hrib, 2000). The most important natural conditions co-creating the floodplain forests are (i) meandering rivers, (ii) high groundwater table and nutrient reach fluvisols and (iii) regular flooding (Klimo et al, 2008).…”

“…The area under study is composed not only from valuable floodplain forests (Horák, 1961;Klimo et al 2008;Maděra et al 2011Maděra et al , 2013Řepka et al 2015) but there occur also the continental floodplain meadows (Vicherek et al, 2000) with solitary oak trees (Maděra et al, 2007) creating famous landscape character of the area. High abundance of many endangered xylophagous species of insect (Miklín et al, 2018(Miklín et al, , 2017Miklín & Čížek, 2014;Laštůvka et al, 2016), many rare bird species (Machar et al, 2018;Opluštil & Čupa, 2012), amphibians (Šebela, 2004;Suchomel et al, 2017), invertebrates and other organisms (Hrib & Kordiovský, 2004;Suchomel et al, 2017) due to the occurrence of well preserved habitats like large old trees, forest pools, riverine lakes, water channels and close nature floodplain forests, were reasons why a few small scale protected areas, NATURA 2000, UNESCO Biosphere Reserve were established in the area during last decades.…”

“…Presented paper is third part of articles concerning to vascular plant biodiversity evaluation in south Moravian floodplain forests. The previous were published by Maděra et al (2011Maděra et al ( , 2013 for forest districts Valtice and Tvrdonice. The aim of the work is to describe spatial distribution of vascular plants biodiversity in the area as a tool for both, responsible forest management and conservation efforts.…”

Vascular plant biodiversity of floodplain forest geobiocoenosis in Lower Morava river Basin (forest district Tvrdonice), Czech Republic

“…The Morava river in the studied area forms the border between the Czech Republic and Slovakia (Fig.1). A short description of the historical development of the area and its significance for nature conservation was presented in the previous study (Maděra et al 2011), which concerned the Valtice forest district.…”

“…Horák (1961) focused on the typology of floodplain forests, Vicherek et al (2000) dealt with a floristic inventory in map squares regardless of forest or non-forest biotopes, Danihelka et al (1995) and Danihelka & Šumberová (2004) described the distribution of selected taxa. Maděra et al (2011) presented the results of a floristic inventory of floodplain forests within the Valtice forest district.…”