Forest Vegetation Classification: A Tool for the Study, Management, and Conservation of Forest Ecosystems

Dear Colleagues,

Vegetation classification represents one of the most basic and widely used approaches for studying ecosystems. Although the distinction of plant communities has been an issue of controversy during the last century, the usefulness of the distinction of plant assemblages, having either a more stochastic or deterministic nature, for the study of plant ecology and geography as well as for applied purposes such as nature management and conservation, is uncontroversial. Forests are among the most complex ecosystems. Their floristic composition reflects environmental patterns and complex species interactions at the present time but also of the past (from tens of years ago up to millennia). The classification of the vegetation has traditionally served as the key for the generation and testing of hypotheses concerning the factors that have shaped these complex patterns of forest ecosystems’ diversity. Identifying plant communities also constitutes the basis for studying and understanding the functional diversity of forests, through the comparison of plant traits composition between different communities. Vegetation classification is also fundamental for applied purposes. Vegetation types or communities comprise the fundamental units for management and conservation in most places of the world. We invite studies based on forest vegetation classification and dealing with all aspects of vegetation ecology, such as explorative or explanatory studies testing certain hypotheses or vegetation classification studies at a regional or broader scale, up to applied studies concerning forest management and conservation.

Prof. Dr. Ioannis Tsiripidis
Guest Editor

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• Forest vegetation classification
• Plant communities
• Diversity (Compositional, Functional, Phylogenetic)
• Forest habitat types Forest monitoring
• Conservation
• Forest management
• Plant geography
• Forest ecosystem services