Morphological parameters leaves woody plants in an urban environment (on Gomel example)

Abstract

At present much attention is paid to the investigation of the indicative features of organisms on the whole and vegetative objects in particular. However, it should be noted that sources of toxic elements distributed unevenly on the territories and having various character and intensity in the form of the enterprises and constructions create rather motley picture of environmental pollution both by structure of pollutants, and by their concentration. Therefore an important scientific problem is the examination not only of changes in conditions of technogenic influence in general, but the research of dependence of intensity of morphological plants parameters change on structure and concentration of chemical pollutants in the environment, and also the assessment of possible consequences of pollutants accumulation in vegetative objects. This was the aim of this work. To perform the work used landscape-geochemical analysis include, extending the definition of the emission factor load, characteristic technogene sources of pollution in the form of industrial plants, evaluation of storage medium (vegetation). Vegetation condition was assessed by determining morphological parameters - the length and width of the leaf blade. The article presents a comparative assessment of the anthropogenic impact level of the largest industrial enterprises on the air state in the city of Gomel. Enterprises of western and southern industrial zone have proved to make the greatest contribution to the urban air pollution. The value of the standard deviation was used to assess the degree of anthropogenic impact of industrial enterprises on morphological parameters of woody plants. This index increased in the western and southern industrial zones in the direction from the enterprises with the large volume of pollutant emissions to the enterprises with the small volume of emissions. This trend is caused by stabilizing selection action due to the environmental stress in the form of emissions of the industrial enterprises in these zones. It is also revealed that in western and southern industrial zones the formation of the leaf blade length and width depends more on the level of anthropogenic impact of the chemical plant, combined heat and power plant, JSC «Centrolit» and JSC «Gomeldrev» compared with other companies, that should be considered when further improvement of environmental activities. The results are generally characterized by scientific novelty of the research and can be used for the purpose of indexing the level of anthropogenic impact on urban areas and further improve the methods of monitoring the state of the urban environment. Next it is planned to evaluate the morphological parameters of the leaf blade of woody plants growing in the area of two large industrial enterprises of the Gomel region – JSC «Mozyr Oil Refinery» (Mozyr), JSC «Belarusian Metallurgical Plant» (Zhlobin) and in city parklands. Then the further testing of the heavy metals content will be carried out in the samples of woody plants, grasses and soil from the territory of the industrial enterprises and parklands of the city of Gomel, Mozyr, and Zhlobin.