ecologia mediterranea – Vol. 46 (1) – 2020 17

Introduction

Quercus ithaburensis is an Eastern Mediterranean semi-deciduous oak of the Fagaceae family, which includes two subspecies,

Q. ithaburensis subsp. macrolepis

(valonia oak) (Kotschy) Hedge & Yalt. and

Q. ithaburensis Decne. subsp. ithaburensis

(tabor oak) (Davis 1982; Govaerts & Frodin 1998). Valonia oak grows in Italy, in the Salentina peninsula, in South Albania, in Greece, and in Western and Southwestern Anatolia (Pantera et al. 2008). Tabor oak is found mainly in Israel, Syria and Lebanon, northwestern Jordan, etc. (Dufour-Dror & Ertas 2004). In Greece, it can be found from the islands to many continental parts of the country (Figure 1). They can be distinguished by their distinctive semi-curcular crown (Tsitsoni et al. 2015), forming open canopy forests with a lush understory vegetation for livestock production (Pantera et al. 2008; 2018) and are included in the agroforestry systems of high natural and cultural value of Europe (den Herder et al. 2017). A significant proportion of these forests was cleared from areas of alluvial plains, which are constituted as their original potential territories, and were subsequently used for agriculture or other land uses (Barbero & Quézel 1976; Quézel & Abstract

Vegetation types with Quercus ithaburensis

subsp. macrolepis in Greece

Received: 17 Dec., 2019; First decision: 28 March, 2020; Revised: 15 May, 2020; Accepted: 18 May, 2020.