European Russian Forests

Download or read book European Russian Forests written by Olga V. Smirnova and published by Springer. This book was released on 2018-03-23 with total page 572 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The European Russian forests are described within the boreal, hemiboreal and nemoral forest regions; floodplain forests are also characterized. The book presents a classification and description of forest vegetation, soil characteristic and assessments of plant diversity and successional status of forest plant communities. Structure and composition of vegetation in early- and late-successional forests are analyzed with an emphasis on forests in State Nature reserves. Features of the historical land-use, such as slash-and-burn, forest cutting, grazing, influence of fires on forest ecosystems, etc. are discussed for each forest region. The book contains an analysis of the general dynamics of the forest cover during the last two decades based on satellite image processing. The main stages of transformation of forest landscapes in European Russia during the Holocene are briefly reviewed in connection with the development of the production economy of people.