Biodiversity and climate in national park "Alchanay"
Larisa M. Dolgaleva
Far Eastern Federal University, Vladivostok, Russia
Problems of identification of climatic changes and questions of probable trends of forest vegetation of East Transbaikalia are extremely important for preservation of a biodiversity. At the same time, research of a biodiversity in Transbaikalia was studied sporadically until present time.
Only with the organization of new National parks it becames possible to estimate temporal changes of the forests to reveal the climatic factors influencing a biodiversity. Researches were conducted in national park "Alkhanay" in 2003-2017. Results:
1. Various dynamic processes caused by the current climate changes are reflected in structure of forest phytocoenoses. Trends of climatic changes in forest biomes of "Alkhanay" reflect patterns of regional warming. In the southern forest-steppe areas the processes of both warming and aridization are well expressed.
2. The structure and a biodiversity of forest vegetation of "Alkhanay" are determined by wide variations of habitats. There are three belts of vegetation: subalpine, forest and forest-steppe. A variety of forest phytocoenoses is greater in the mountain and taiga boreal forests and in light-coniferous forests.
3. Warming of climate and aridization can be caused by deforestation along the rivers. Aridization of river valleys influences a biodiversity of ecosystems in the forest belt.
4. Multidirectional changes in different types of plant communities in areas with an island permafrost are also caused by climatic fluctuations. Thermophilic species become more common in boreal dark-coniferous forests and mesophytic species intensively invade the hemiboreal light-conifer forests. With warming climate a great increase of xerophytes is expected in the expositional forest-steppe plant communities. In the forests and forest-steppe communities a replacement of Larix sibirica with Pinus silvestris is expected that will result in evening the forest-steppe landscapes.