Woody and Grassy Vegetation Development in Different Landscape Elements of the Curonian Spit

Abstract

The species of woody and grassy establish on seashore sands and wastes. These plants are adapted for less favorable existence conditions some of them growing in littoral habitats of excessive moisture and salinity. Other tolerates infertile and dry sand. The purpose of the study have been analyzed the dispersion vegetation in different relief elements of the coastal protective dune look for a relation between woody and grassy plant species to foresee the tendencies of further seashore landscape development. It has been established that in locations with intensive flow of visitors a net of trodden paths is formed where the plants cover is disappearing very fast as there are suitable conditions for the springtime and autumn winds to erode the coastal protective dune of the seashore of the Curonian spit. The trodden path in a couple of years turn into 2 – 3 m. vides sand drifting corridors, but the lies of the holiday makers become there 4 – 5 m. wide pit and hollow. After these formations have interconnected they shape deflations of different size. The drifting sand carried by the prevailing western direction winds swamp the beyond coastal dune plains and the outskirts of the forest and sandy meadows. The statistical analysis of projection cover of plant shows that during the last 27 years (from 1982) the conditions for vegetation survival on the Curonian spit seashore sand dunes are gradually deteriorating.