Kaszab Zoltán (szerk.): A Magyar Természettudományi Múzeum évkönyve 63. (Budapest 1971)
Fekete, G. ; Szujkó-Lacza, J.: A survey of the plant life-form systems and the respective research approaches III. Rankiaer's life-form conception. The application of life-forms in the characterization of phytoclimate and in vegetation analysis
the elaboration of the principal phytoclimates and the comparison to the "biological spectrum"; this is the normal spectrum based on random selection (1908, 1918). A deviation from this in the several climates is characteristic in one or some lifeform categories. The followings are characteristic of RAUNKIAER'S way of thinking, free of absolutization: "It is of course not true that plants in a definite climate all belong to one single life-form, but the main types of climates are characterized by the fact that one or few life-forms are relatively or absolutely dominant. This can be expressed numerically" (RAUNKIAER, 1907). The phytoclimates received their name after the main types of the life-forms; RAUNKIAER himself paid great attention to elaborate the boreo-arctic Chamaephyton-climate and the Mediterranean Therophyton-climate. He was unable, however, to base a phytoclimate on the Cryptophytes, because "it appears that no main plant climate exists characterized by Cryptophytes to such a high degree that it deserves the name of Cryptophyton-climate" (1918). Thus the Cryptophytes are to be considered a complementary phenomenon in the northern moderate Hemicryptophyton-climate. This moment also underlines the complexity of the life-form —phytoclimate problem. The interpretation of the Cryptophyton life-form as a climatic indicator is further involved by the fact that a. to this group belong not only all Geophytes living in the soil —therefore in a substrate more or less harmonizing with the macroclimate —but also the Helophytes and Hydrophytes, whose substrate —-blurring zonality and the macroclimatic connections — is water; b. the Cryptophyton is the life-form which is most bound to taxonomic units: to certain families ("constitutional" feature). It is also true, however, that some of these families (e.g. Liliaceae, Orobanchaceae) range in a largely uniform climate (nothern temperate zone). * * * The theory of RAUNKIAER'S phytoclimates soon found a vivid response as well in as outside Europe. Apart from the advantage which the determination of the life-form of innumerable plant species is in itself, the drafting of the many life-form spectra and biological spectra represents the positive contribution. In the followings we shall attempt to analyse some further important problem of RAUNKIAER'S biological spectra and the connections of the phytoclimates characterized by them (cf. ADAMSON, 1939; CAIN, 1950; WALTER, 1962, etc.). It is stated by several authors that life-form does not change concurrently with climate in every case. Studying the vegetation of New Zealand, ALLEN (1939) found, for instance, that the life-form spectrum of climatically wholly different areas is identical, although according to the subsequently published WALTER — LIETH climatic Atlas (1962) there exist only two nearly related oceanic climatic zones (V, VI) and the species react to changes only by their stature and not by their presence or absence. On the other hand, great differences in the biological spectra may appear between areas of diverse floral evolution —even if the climatic similarity is extensive between them today. Based on RAUNKIAER'S, BRAUN—BLANQUET'S, TURILL'S and ADAMSON'S material, CAIN (1950) demonstrated that the European Mediterranean and the South African "Mediterranean" climates can be characterized, despite their equally dry summers and mild winters, by essentially different life-form spectra. It was ADAMSON who showed (1939), using RAUNKIAER'S, PAULSEN'S, HAGERUP'S, OSBORN'S, and COMPTON'S data, that the life-form spectra of deserts
