Plant strategy types and vegetation development reflecting different forms of vineyard management 1

Abstract

Abstract. Phytosociological investigations of the undergrowth in vineyards in the southern part of the Upper Rhine region, southwestern Germany, over many years are briefly reported. Besides my own data collected over nearly a decade, appropriate releves of earlier authors have been included for comparison. The cultivation regimes have changed more drastically in the course of time ‐ and continue to do so ‐ than they have in other types of agricultural types. The principal cultivation methods are: mechanical soil movement by tilling, herbicide application, and mulching (see Fig. 1). These three types of measures tend to be applied in alternation, both temporally and spatially. Their effects are very different in intensity and time of action, and consequently they cause varying species combinations to build plant communities (Table 1).The concept of strategy‐type is discussed and the approach of ‘key characters’ in the sense of Grubb is stressed. Such traits of adaptive value for important species in the vineyard undergrowth are presented in Table 2, for the aspects life form, developmental rhythm, and diaspore formation and dispersal. The combination of such population biological parameters yields a number of strategy‐types. In the community description the concept of agroform is used, i.e. a subtype of a plant community brought about by a special agricultural technique. Frequent soil movement results in the dominance of therophytes: the Stellaria media‐ ‘agroform’ of the Geranio rotundifolii‐Allietum Tx. 50; mulching promotes perennials with runners, leading to a Poa trivialis‐Lolio‐Potentillion community (Wilmanns 1989); moderate spraying with herbicides promotes geophytes, winter annuals, woody plants and succulents: Bromus sterilis‐ agroform of the Geranio‐Allietum. As examples of characteristic species, Allium vineale and Geranium rotundifolium are analysed.