CHOROLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF THE ENDEMIC FLORA IN THE METOHIAN PROKLETIJE MOUNTAINS

The Metohian Prokletije Mountains are the outermost southeastern branch of interior Dinaric Alps. They are one of the most important centers of floristic diversity of the Balkan Peninsula, with many endemic Balkan species.


INTRODUCTION
The Prokletije Mountains belong to the Dinaric Alps region within the wide Mediterranean mountain chain zone.They are one of the most complex mountain ranges on the Balkan Peninsula consisting of 24 mountain groups situated in the border zone of Serbia, Montenegro and Albania.
The Metohian Prokletije Mountains are geologically very diverse with various rocks formations (magmatic, sediment and metamorphic), ranging from Paleozoic to the Quaternary age.The whole area is dominated by glacial, periglacial, karst and fluvial relief with steep ridges, almost erect craggy walls and deep river valleys, gorges and canyons (Belij, 2003).

MATERIALS AND METHODS
As a result of comprehensive field work conducted from 1994 to 1997 in the area of the Metohian Prokletije Mountains, which comprise c. 96000 ha from 500 to 2656 m, as well as literature survey, abundant herbarium material was collected and deposited in the Herbarium of the Institute for Nature Conservation of Serbia and the Institute for Nature Conservation of Vojvodina province.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
So far 1611 taxa of species and subspecies level have been recorded in the high mountain zone of the Metohian Prokletije Mountains above the forest line, i.e. 44% of vascular flora in Serbia (Amidžić, Panjković, 2003), with 283 Balkan endemic taxa (about 14% of all recorded taxa).The class Dicotyledones within division Magnoliophyta was dominant with 1303 taxa classified into 352 genera and 85 families.The class Monocotyledones was represented by 255 taxa classified into 81 genera and 12 families.
The richest genus, with 33 recorded endemic taxa, was Hieracium L., which distinguishes the Dinaric Alps as one of the centers of Hieracium evolution and diversity.It is followed by the genus Dianthus L. with 9 taxa, which shows the interconnection of Prokletije Mountains and the wider East Mediterranean area as the speciation center of this genus.Other important genera were Achillea L., Campanula L., Stachys L., Thymus L. and Saxifraga L. with 6 taxa, and Centaurea L., Trifolium L., Knautia L., Melampyrum L. and Viola L. with 5 taxa (Tab.2).
The most recent estimates show that Balkan Peninsula flora cointains 2600 to 2700 endemic taxa with c. 400 local endemics (Stevanović et al., 2005).On the area of the Metohian Prokletije Mountains (c.96000 ha) over 10% of Balkan endemic taxa and about 6% of Balkan local endemic taxa can be found, which strongly supports its importance as a center of floristic diversity in the Balkans.

Table 1 .
Number of endemic taxa by family.