Szekessy Vilmos (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 62. (Budapest 1970)

Fekete, G. ; Szujkó-Lacza, J.: A survey of the plant life-form systems and the respective research approaches, II.

extense of the root-system, the surface of the absorbing roots, and the sprouting ability of the roots. In contrast to GOLUBEV, ZOZULIN (1961, 1968) creates his types based on chiefly one plant characteristic, but this single feature may really have an emphatic role in the constant dynamism of the structure of a community. An important characteristic of his life-form concept is the consideration of the phytocoenological environment, since the evolvement and development of the life-forms outside of the coenosis is unimaginable. The role of the species within the coenosis is of the same principal importance as, for instance, that of the renovating buds in RAUNKIAER'S system. According to ZOZULIN, RAUNKIAER'S, PACHOVSKI'S, and other authors's points of view represent merely details in the evolvement of the lifeforms. In his opinion, it is a trend of the vegetable organism to assure a place for itself—within the community and in close coexistence with other species—in the usually maximally saturated habitat, a place for its survival and spreading. The effectiveness of this vegetable endeavour is closely connected with the adaptational character of the supraterraneous organs. ZOZULIN'S life-form system {1961) is contracted into four life-form types (with an additional fifth in 1968). The basis of these life-form types is the means and methods of the supraterranean parts regenerating themselves after their annihilation. The life-form types are: redditive plants—perennials which do not posses regenerating buds and thus cede, subsequent to the annihilation of their supraterranean parts, their formerly occupied sites to other individuals; restative plants—perennials which are able, after the destruction of their supraterranean parts, to regenerate and survive, and thus resist the expansion of other individuals; irrumptive plants—perennials which, after the destruction of their supraterranean parts do not only regenerate but can vegetatively also expand and to occupy by their supra- or subterranean organs new sites at the expense of other individuals ; vagative plants—annuals or biannuals which disseminate only by seeds and which, by migrating, are able to appear in also new territories. To these four life-form types was later added the group of insident plants which do not occupy some part of the habitat, •or, more exactly, which settle on other plants (epiphytes, parasites, saprophytes). Within the life-form types, ZOZULIN establishes subtypes, based mainly on the annual rhythm (e.g. evergreen conifers, evergreens, deciduous plants). With respect to the restative and irrumptive life-form types, he creates a periodic subtype, the herbaceous plants which, during their annual cycle, lose the supraterranean parts and then regenerate from the subterranean ones. The subtypes comprise subgroups whose main criteria are the number of shoots, the general rate •of growth and spreading intensity ; the life-form groups consist of the several lifeforms revealing, according to ZOZULIN, qualitatively similar adaptive abilities for survival and reprodution. These life-forms are described chiefly by the morphology of the vegetative propagating organ, with the terminology of the earlier Russian or Soviet predecessors and the application of their results. The Russian-Soviet life-form investigation, subserving the exploration of «ssociational structure and coenotic dynamism, shows a specifically ecological aspect. Concrete morphological, anatomical, and occasionally also physiological investigations all find their place in its methods of study, hence they are frequently much divergent from one another ; their common feature is their principally qualitative character. Their life-form terms embrace significant new concepts, subsuming into a dialectic unity the plant, the environment, and the heretofore detected methods of their interaction.