Mantle vegetation includes plant communities dominated mostly by shrubs and occurs in habitats where the typical tree layers meet difficulties to evolve. This study was conducted in three areas of Bulgaria – Western Balkan Range, Western Sredna Gora Mt. and the Fore-Balkan. Numerical classification and ordination were performed by PC-ORD and JUICE software packages. Diagnostic species were determined by calculating the Phi-coefficient. Two associations and one plant community of the