ONTOMORPHOGENESIS AND CОENOPOPULATION STRUCTURE OF CREPIS PURPUREA (WILLD.) M. BIEB. IN CRIMEA

The study is devoted to ontomorphogenesis and the structure of cоenopopulations of the rare species Crepis purpurea (Willd.) M. Bieb., protected by the Red Data Book of Sevastopol, the Republic of Crimea, Turkey and I Appendix of the Berne Convention. The duration, morphological and anatomical features of the age states in the pregenerative, generative and senile periods of C. purpurea ontogenesis are established. The total duration of ontogenesis is 5–6 years, which includes 4 ontogenetic periods and 9 age states. C. purpurea is characterized by the structural type of polyvariance with the formation of 3 ontobiomorphic variants: individuals with one-, two-, or many-headed caudex. The features and the period of the onset of anatomical partition in the shoot part caudex were revealed. Germination of C. purpurea seeds was determined. The ontogenetic, vitality and spatial structure of 11 Crimean cоenopopulations of C. purpurea were carried out. The lack of the pregenerative and senile individuals fractions is observed in coenopopulations. The basic ontogenetic spectrum of the studied populations is bimodal with a peak on virgin and mature generative individuals. The indices of renewability, generativeness, aging, the general age of the population, as well as the age indices of A. A. Uranov and the efficiency of L. A. Zhivotovsky were calculated for each population. In the vital structures there is a dynamic on the increase in the values of the index of vital quality of populations from the eastern foothills to the western foothills and further – to the mountain plateaus variants of populations. It was established that individuals of C. purpurea have a tendency to tend to a group type of distribution in the population. The data on areas of coenopopulations, the number and density of individuals of C. purpurea in the studied communities are presented.