Юбилей «Геоботанического картографирования»: некоторые итоги

Abstract

The journal “Geobotanical mapping” presents the main stages and directions of the vegetation cartography development in Russia (USSR) and abroad over the past 60 years. The 1960–1980s were a period of some theoretical generalizations, the development of new types of maps initiated by the V. B. Sochava’s botanical cartographic school in Irkutsk. Since the late 1980s up to the present thematic mapping has been actively improved due to implementation of GIS technologies, automatic interpretation of remote sensing data, and usage of high-resolution space spectral images. The main directions of the vegetation mapping published in the “Geobotanical mapping” journal at the beginning of XXI century are: 1) global and regional differentiation of vegetation cover, macrostructures, evolutionary constructions; 2) vegetation dynamics, predictive mapping; 3) ecological and phytoecological mapping, ecoregions; 4) large-scale inventory and assessment mapping; 5) spatial structure of vegetation cover, typology of territorial units; 6) mapping as the basis for geobotanical zoning; 7) mapping of habitats and biotopes. The vegetation map organizes the information that is needed for mapping — data on vegetation classification; ecology of vegetation, the distribution of plant communities, their types, dominant’s coverage, vertical and horizontal structure of communities. The map is suitable for further cartometric and morphometric analysis and obtaining map information that was not explicitly included in the mapping process. The cartometric indicators such as size, shape, length of the perimeter of contours, areal ratio of various types etc. require their carefully tested interpretation from the standpoint of knowledge of processes and phenomena in vegetation. The vegetation map is not only the final result of vegetation study, it is a reason to organize scientific branches of geobotany — vegetation classification, dynamics, structure — into a certain sequence. Geobotanical mapping raises the question of correspondence of two basic concepts of vegetation science — the plant community and the vegetation cover continuum. The study of characteristics of vegetation cover structures, geobotanical zoning units helps us to the study of vegetation continuum, and the categories of common species, differentiating species and some others can be implemented.