Botanica Pacifica. A journal of plant science and conservation Advertised in Issue 2012. 1(1)
BOOK Bakalin, V.A., O.Yu. Pisarenko, V.Ya. Cherdantseva, P.V. Krestov, M.S. Ignatov, E.A. Ignatova 2012. Bryophytes of Sakhalin (V.A. Bakalin, ed.), Far Eastern Federal University Press, Vladivostok, 306 pp. (in Russian with English abstract and tables/figures legends).
Sakhalin Island is situated in north-western part of Pacific Ocean, in the Sea of Okhotsk, close to the eastern edge of Asian mainland. It stretches almost for one thousand kilometers between the latitudes 46 and 54° N. Although the vegetation of Sakhalin is composed of boreal forests dominated by spruce, fir and larch; it includes many Temperate species characteristic for East Asian flora. The research of bryophytes in Sakhalin Island has begun in 1850s by the members of the Russian Geographic Society, F.B. Schmidt and P.P. Glehn. Nevertheless, until 1960s the field investigations of bryophytes in Sakhalin were conducted sparsely by not-professional bryologists. Before 1965 only 65 species of liverworts and 160 species of mosses were known in the Island. The comprehensive bryological study was started in 1963 by Dr. V. Ya. Cherdantseva, who has completed the first bryophytes checklist of southern Sakhalin. The modern stage has been started in 2000s by authors of the present book and can be characterized as intensive and purposeful.
The book begins from overviews of geographical position, geological history, climate, history of bryological exploration, as well as detailed description of vegetation around the island with the special attention to the bryophyte participation in the Sakhalin flora formation. The main part of the monograph represented by the hepatic and moss conspecta, which contain information on the presence of generative and vegetative structures in studied material, altitudinal range of taxa and their distribution in the island and ecological peculiarities. The distribution of taxa within Sakhalin is given in the series of dot maps provided for each species. Taxonomical and geographical comments are given for selected taxa. It is recognized 438 species of mosses belonging to 172 genera and 56 families, and 198 species of hepatics from 71 genera of 36 families. The conspecta followed by the analyses that was made separately for mosses and hepatics. The main resuklats of analysis are: 1) the specificity of bryophyte flora of Sakhalin is in: a) the presence of large group of cryophilic taxa (many of them remained as relicts in East-Sakhalin Mountains) and b) the occurrence of taxa with presumably South Temperate or even Temperate-Subtropical distribution (located mostly in the forest communities in southern tip of the island); 2) the effect of insularity in Sakhalin bryophyte flora is not apparent that could be explained by often contacts of the island with continental land masses, 3) Schmidt's phytogeographic line appears to be the robust phytogeographic border for bryophyte flora too, but the rank of this line at regional level remains unclear.
The book is available from the editor:
Vadim A. Bakalin, Botanical Garden-Institute FEB RAS, Makovskii Street 142, Vladivostok, 690024, Russia. e-mail: vabakalingmail.com
gmail.com