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Reseda inodora Rchb. in the Tiszántúl region (East Hungary)
48-54Views:145On 14 August 2012 a small population of Reseda inodora was found in Hegyes-halom kurgan within the administrative boundaries of the town of Mindszent (Csongrád County, CEU: 9487.3). The approximately 50–100-stem-large population of the species lived on the edge of the kurgan, on the sparsely vegetated, weedy fieldmargin. On 19 July 2014 this species has turned up again in this area. In this case it was the biggest amount with some hundred stems and was located on the edge of the mound, which is in the verge of the neighbouring corn field. The Reseda inodora is a new recent protected vascular plant species within the operation area of the Körös–Maros National Park. We propose this species to be included in the regional red list in the category of „CR” (Critically endangered). Other rare weed or pioneer species (Caucalis platycarpos subsp. muricata and subsp. platycarpos, Erodium ciconium, Lappula squarrosa, Melica transsilvanica, Papaver hybridum) have already been found in Hegyes-halom kurgan in the last few years. The results show the importance of kurgans not only in the conservation of natural steppe, loess wall vegetation and steppe shrub species, but in the survival of some endangered weed species as well (e.g. some rare archaeophytes).
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Discovery of a new large population of Prunus tenella on a young old-field suggests remarkable regeneration ability of the species
32-38Views:302Kurgans are ancient burial mounds built by nomadic steppic cultures across Eurasia.
These monuments are important cultural landmarks, and often also preserve the remnants of dry grasslands even in intensively used agricultural landscapes. In the past centuries, many kurgans have been ploughed and their vegetation has been destroyed. Due to their recent inclusion in the agrienvironmental schemes in Hungary, crop production has been ceased on many kurgans in the past years. Here we present an interesting botanical discovery which we made during our country-scale survey of spontaneously recovering grasslands on kurgans. We discovered a large population of approximately 15,000 shoots of the protected loess grassland plant Prunus tenella Batsch (syn.: Amygdalus nana L.) on the Fekete-halom kurgan near Tiszainoka, in the centre of the Great Hungarian Plain. The mound had been used as an intensive cropland until 2014. Most probably, the plants could re-establish from some hidden shoots that could persist in the refuge provided by the concrete elements of a geodesic mark, and after the cessation of ploughing it could expand onto the north and west-facing slopes of the mound by sprouting and by germination from the persistent soil seed bank. Besides the conservation importance of this floristic discovery, it also suggests that spontaneous regeneration can be an effective restoration measure and that kurgans abandoned from agricultural cultivation can serve as suitable habitats for rare and endangered species.