<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>Ornamental plantations in cities and particularly botanical gardens and arboreta are rich sources of alien flora. Mlyňany Arboretum, established in 1892, cultivates 1049 non-native woody plant species on the area of 67 ha. In this work we answered following questions: 1. How many taxa are spontaneously spreading in the arboretum and how is the spreading intensity related to their ecological demands and reproduction traits? 2. How many taxa appear behind the fence? 3. How far from the arboretum they can get? 4. Do private gardens and historical aristocratic park in the studied village cluster contribute to species escapes from culture? 5. Which from the widely spread taxa can represent future risk of invasiveness on the national level? We found that about one tenth of taxa spread across the arboretum (particularly <italic>Cotoneaster</italic> spp., <italic>Prunus laurocerasus, P. serotina</italic> and <italic>Quercus rubra</italic>) and number of their seedlings corresponded only with the mother plant number. Almost one third of these species left the arboretum and their seedlings were observed in distance up to 500 m from the village (mainly <italic>Mahonia aquifolium</italic>, <italic>P. serotina</italic>). Private gardens were a large source of <italic>Juglans regia</italic> seedlings, frequency of which decreased with the distance from villages (no species escaped from the historical park). Weed risk assessment revealed potential invasion danger only for <italic>Amorpha fruticosa.</italic></p></abstract>

Ornamental plantations in cities and particularly botanical gardens and arboreta are rich sources of alien flora. Mlyňany Arboretum, established in 1892, cultivates 1049 non-native woody plant species on the area of 67 ha. In this work we answered following questions: 1. How many taxa are spontaneously spreading in the arboretum and how is the spreading intensity related to their ecological demands and reproduction traits? 2. How many taxa appear behind the fence? 3. How far from the arboretum they can get? 4. Do private gardens and historical aristocratic park in the studied village cluster contribute to species escapes from culture? 5. Which from the widely spread taxa can represent future risk of invasiveness on the national level? We found that about one tenth of taxa spread across the arboretum (particularly Cotoneaster spp., Prunus laurocerasus, P. serotina and Quercus rubra) and number of their seedlings corresponded only with the mother plant number. Almost one third of these species left the arboretum and their seedlings were observed in distance up to 500 m from the village (mainly Mahonia aquifolium, P. serotina). Private gardens were a large source of Juglans regia seedlings, frequency of which decreased with the distance from villages (no species escaped from the historical park). Weed risk assessment revealed potential invasion danger only for Amorpha fruticosa.

Invasions of alien woody plant taxa across a cluster of villages neighbouring the Mlyňany Arboretum (SW Slovakia)

Folia Oecologica

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Ornamental plantations in cities and particularly botanical gardens and arboreta are rich sources of alien flora. Mlyňany Arboretum, established in 1892,...

Invasions of alien woody plant taxa across a cluster of villages neighbouring the Mlyňany Arboretum (SW Slovakia)

Published Online: Nov 24, 2020

Page range: 121 - 130

Received: May 07, 2020

Accepted: Sep 30, 2020

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/foecol-2020-0014

Keywords
arboretum, escape from culture, historical park, village cluster, weed risk assessment

© 2020 Peter Ferus et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Invasions of alien woody plant taxa across a cluster of villages neighbouring the Mlyňany Arboretum (SW Slovakia)

Published Online: Nov 24, 2020

Page range: 121 - 130

Received: May 07, 2020

Accepted: Sep 30, 2020

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/foecol-2020-0014

Keywordsarboretum, escape from culture, historical park, village cluster, weed risk assessment

© 2020 Peter Ferus et al., published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

Keywords
arboretum, escape from culture, historical park, village cluster, weed risk assessment