Grasslands of the Aishihik-Sekulmun Lakes area, Yukon Territory, Canada

Grassland communities found on dry, steep, south-facing slopes in the Aishi hik-Sekulmun Lakes area, southwest Yukon Territory, are dominated by Artemi sia frigida and Carer filifolia, with Calamagrostis purpurascens, Poa glauc a, Penstemon gormanii, Phlox hoodii, and Potentilla nivea subdominant. The grasslands are similar in terms of dominants and subdominants to other gras slands in southwest Yukon, but twelve species that have not been recorded a t other sites were found in the Aishihik-Sekulmun area. The composite speci es list from southwest Yukon grasslands was compared to those from grasslan ds found in Alaska and in the boreal forest on the northern Great Plains. T hese three regions share a number of species; however, at least 25% of the species in each region are restricted to that region alone and absent from the other two. The southwest Yukon grasslands flora contains the following groups: species restricted to southwest Yukon, species found in both southw est Yukon and Great Plains grasslands, species found in both southwest Yuko n and Alaska grasslands, and species found in grasslands in all three regio ns. Further work is needed to more fully characterize the floristic compone nts of southwest Yukon grasslands and variations among them.