The supralittoral vascular plants of islands of the Lesser Kuril ridge

The supralittoral or splash zone is a land area on the sea border located above the maximum tide. A considerable salinity of the substrate as a result of tidal processes dominates here. There are daily, weekly, monthly and seasonal fluctuations in air and water temperature, salinity, moisture and other factors in this zone. Variable living conditions de-termine the diversity of its fauna and flora increased in seismically active areas of the World Ocean. Since the establishment of the "Malyi Kurils" wildlife reserve (1972) and the State nature reserve "Kurilsky" (1984) a new stage in the study of flora of this part of the Far Eastern region has begun. The various ecotopes from subtidal zone to highlands were investigated. However, the floristic composi-tion of the gravel and sand supralittoral wasn't stud-ied enough. The aim of the work was to analyze taxonomic, geographic, ecological-coenotic compo-sition and life forms of supralittoral vascular plants of Lesser Kurile ridge. In 2013 the research was carried out on the islands of Shikotan, Yuri and Zelenyi, and 19 species of vascular plants were found. Familes Asteraceae and Polygonaceae were the largest ones. The genus Persicaria, Rumex and Sonchus included 2 species, while the rest included one. The Krabovaya Bay' flora of Shikotan Island is the most diverse on the level of species, genus and families. The most common types of species areal are East-Asian and circumpolar species, they ac-count for 62 % of all species. The presence of north-Pacific (19 %) and Eurasian (19 %) species is characteristic of the studied flora. It was found out that 75 % of the species belonged either to the litto-ral seaside or meadow marsh eco-floristic com-plexes. It was noted that 38 % of all species were annuals, and 62 % of ones were perennials.