PROJECTIVE PLANE CHLOROPHYLL CONTENT AND THE BIOLOGICAL DIVERSITY OF VEGETATION IN THE MAIN GEOBOTANIC ZONES OF RUSSIA

The annual photosynthetic sequestering of atmospheric carbon in the te rritory of Russia was calculated at 4.4 billion tons, based on literat ure data. The annual photosynthetic deposition of atmospheric carbon i nto living and dead phytomass was examined. A positive correlation (r= 0.72) was found between the annual photosynthetic carbon sequestering and projective plane chlorophyll content. This correlation appears not to be species-specific, except for phytocenoses of the dark coniferou s forests. On average, about 145 kg of carbon per kg of chlorophyll is bound in the organic biomass of any plant community per year. In term s of soil projective coverage, predomination of a particular plant spe cies in the studied plant communities resulted in an increase in the n umber of overground shoots of the dominating species (r=0.93-0.98); th is domination mechanism did not depend on plant species. The first sto ry of the tree stands on the level of tree crowns contributed the bulk of the total projective plane chlorophyll content (from 70 to 90%). P rojective plane chlorophyll content measured for two or three dominant plant species provides a satisfactory quantitative estimate of the ph otosynthetic carbon sequestering in complex phytocenoses.