Occurrence of the wild vine Vitis vinifera ssp. silvestris in Europe

This paper summarizes the occurrence of the European wild vine - Vitis vini fera L. ssp. silvestris (Gmelin) Hegi - from bibliography and observations made in the framework of research on its ecology in the alluvial and colluv ial forests of Europe. The state of the wild vine is disquieting within mos t of the European countries; in some countries we noticed a lack of recent reliable data. The subspecies silvestris can principally be distinguished f rom cultivated grapevine by its dioicity. Morphological vegetative criteria are very variable; in particular, we demonstrate that sexual dimorphism oc curs in Austrian populations, while it is not found in those of the Basque countries.