The range of environmental and cenotic characteristics of Humulus lupulus L. in the south of Western Siberia

Abstract

Background. Economic importance of the hop as a resource species and its widespread distribution in the south of Western Siberia determine the relevance of studying its environmental and cenotic affinity to assess its natural resource potential.

Materials and methods. A set of 247 descriptions from the Turboveg database of geobotanical information, pertaining to common hop from Altai and Krasnoyarsk Territories, Novosibirsk, Tyumen, Omsk, and Kemerovo Provinces and the Altai Republic, was analyzed. The IBIS software package was used to process the descriptions. CCA ordination (canonical correspondence analysis) with the PAST 4 software package was performed to identify the relationships between plant communities and environmental factors. Thirty-four soil samples were analyzed to characterize edaphic factors.

Results. There is a wide range of environmental and cenotic characteristics of hop habitats within the species’ area of distribution in the south of Western Siberia. The results of the ordination analysis show that based on the EUNIS system modified for Siberia, hop occurs in forest, shrub, grass, and anthropogenic communities. The CCA ordination for hop-including communities helped to define the ranges of factors: soil moisture, hemerobotolerance, soil richness, and soil salinity. On the soil moisture gradient, the entire set of hop-related descriptions occupies the span from 52 to 80 degrees according to the scale of environmental optima for plants in southern Siberia. On the soil richness/salinity gradient, it covers the range of 10–13 degrees, which corresponds to fairly rich soils. The range of acid-base balance (pH) of the soil under study is within 4.3–7.2. The highest content of organic substances (up to 15%) is observed in shrub communities, probably due to the accumulation of litter organic mass. The least amount of humus (1.9–6.5%) is observed in swampy habitats.