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The inventory of the taxa collected in 2021 during the annual field trip of the Working Group for Floristics, Systematics, and Evolution of the Italian Botanical Society is reported. The field trip was held in the Mount Pennino massif, between Umbria and Marche administrative regions (central Italy). The flora documented for the study area amounts to 413 specific and subspecific taxa (including one hybrid), belonging to 234 genera and 64 families. Thirty-seven taxa are endemic to Italy; 42 are included in the IUCN Red List of the Italian Flora. Only three alien taxa were found. Ten taxa and one hybrid are considered floristic novelties because either new or confirmed for the regional flora of Umbria and/or Marche. Particularly, 6 taxa are new and 4 are confirmed for Umbria; one taxon and one hybrid are new for Marche.

The inventory of the taxa collected in 2022 during the annual field trip of the Working Group for Floristics, Systematics and Evolution of the Italian Botanical Society is reported. The field trip was held from 19th to 22th April in the islands of Lipari and Panarea (Aeolian Islands, Sicilia). Overall, 1,664 herbarium specimens were deposited in public and private herbaria. The flora documented for the studied area amounts to 386 specific and subspecific taxa, belonging to 241 genera and 74 families. Centaurea aeolica, Helichrysum litoreum (Asteraceae), and Dianthus rupicola subsp. aeolicus (Caryophyllaceae) were the only three Italian endemics found in the study area, whereas 48 alien taxa were recorded. Dimorphotheca ecklonis (Asteraceae), Nassella tenuissima (Poaceae), Solanum torvum (Solanaceae), and Viola wittrockiana (Violaceae) are casual alien species new to Sicilia, whereas Oenothera odorata (Onagraceae) is a new naturalized alien species for the Italian vascular flora.

The results of the annual excursion of the Working Group for Vegetation Science of the Italian Botanical Society, held in the Egadi Islands, Mount San Giuliano and Mount Cofano (W Sicily) on April 23–27 2022, are presented. This paper includes: (1) general information on the visited sites; (2) geology and geomorphology; (3) climatology and bioclimatology with tables of climatic data; (4) description of the following five geobotanical itineraries – accompanied by 29 original vegetation relevés and 11 synthetic relevés, proceeding from different bibliographic references: (a) Mount San Giuliano; (b) Marettimo Island: coastal and sub-coastal stretch of the southern part, between Punta Bassana and Contrada Chiappera; (c) Marettimo Island: Case Romane, Mount Pizzo Falcone and the north-western coastal stretch; (d) Island of Levanzo; (e) Mount Cofano – with catenal pictograms of the vegetation, surveys and description of the plant communities and related syntaxonomic scheme; (5) list of the surveyed plant taxa, collected specimens and herbaria in which they are deposited. A new syntaxon is also described (Catapodio pauciflori-Moraeetum sisyrinchii ass. nova), referring to an ephemeral dry grassland located along the north-western coastal stretch of Marettimo. The new association is framed in the Plantagini-Catapodion balearici, alliance of the Stipo-Bupleuretalia semicompositi order of the class Stipo-Trachynietea distachyae (order Stipo-Bupleuretalia semicompositi, alliance Plantagini-Catapodion balearici). An original synoptic table, regarding 17 different plant communities with high frequency of Moraea sisyrinchium, provides a comparative framework of the new association with allied vegetation units so far described throughout the Mediterranean region. Syntaxonomical and nomenclatural remarks regarding the Mediterranean vegetation occurring in this territory are also given throughout the text. Some floristic updates for the study sites are also reported, including the discovery for the first time in Sicily of Lysimachia loeflingii.

In this contribution, new data concerning the distribution of vascular flora alien to Italy are presented. It includes new records, confirmations, and status changes for Italy or for Italian administrative regions. Nomenclatural and distribution updates, published elsewhere, and corrections are provided as Suppl. material 1.

Despite the wide amount of scientific contributions published on alien plant species, their diffusion dynamics, and their interactions with native taxa, it is increasingly difficult to slow down their spreading and their negative impact on habitats. Last recent years, in fact, a sharp rise in the number of new alien plant taxa introduced in Italy and Europe has been recorded. The aim of this work is to investigate most of the Italian territory in order to verify whether this alarming trend is still underway. Specimen collections and/or observations of alien plants have been performed in as many as 12 Italian regions. All the collected specimens are stored in public or private herbaria. Taxa have been identified according to the literature from the countries of origin of the investigated taxa, while the nomenclature followed the current international references. Updates on 106 taxa are reported. In particular, among 117 new records, 89 are first records, 27 are changes to status and there is 1 extinction. Seven new taxa for Italian alien flora are reported, two of which are new to Europe. The administrative regions with the highest number of records are Calabria (48), Sardegna (17) and Sicilia (15). Five of the surveyed taxa, for the first time, have been considered invasive aliens to Italian territory. The unfrequent amount of original results provided by this work, over the simple importance of data itself, proves how floristic investigation, still today, represents one of the most effective tools in broadening the current knowledge about alien taxa and their dynamics.

The fragmentation of the natural habitat is a process that is exponentially increasing worldwide and represents one of the biggest threats to biological diversity. Habitat destruction and fragmentation have a major impact on landscapes and may also affect ecosystems, populations, and species. The ongoing anthropogenic process can result in habitat loss for some species, habitat creation for others, reduced patch size, and increased distance between patches, which may lead to local extinction. We analyzed the effects of patch size and isolation on lichens in Quercus pubescens woods surrounding the city of Potenza (south Italy). We randomly sampled 11 forest patches with homogeneous environmental variables using circular plots with a 10 m radius; the patches ranged from 0.3 to 30 ha. For each plot, we collected data about presence and abundance of epiphytic lichens. We performed the analyses at the patch level using linear regression and multivariate analysis, searching for effects on species richness, life forms, and community compositions. Multivariate analyses were used to study the effect of fragmentation on the structure of lichen vegetation. We investigated the main predictor of lichen species richness in habitat fragmentations and concluded that patch area per se is an important (positive) driver of lichen species richness in Mediterranean peri-urban forests.

This study was focused on the diet and feeding behaviour of Lepus corsicanus in two protected coastal areas of Latium, Castelporziano Presidential Estate (CPE) and Circeo National Park (CNP). Plant frequency was assessed by the quadrat method, while diet composition was determined by microhistological analysis of faecal samples. Over the year, the Italian hare fed on 185 of the 229 plant species identified in vegetation, with most of them ingested in low percentages (≤1%). During the dry season (DS), in both areas, Brachypodium sylvaticum, Cynodon dactylon, and Avena fatua were among the most consumed species. In the wet season (WS) the most common plant species in diet were B. sylvaticum, Poa trivialis, and Carex distachya in CPE and Dactylis glomerata, Cynosurus echinatus, and Spartium junceum in CNP. In both sites, considering the annual selection of life forms, grasses and leguminous forbs were preferred, while non-leguminous forbs and shrubs were used less than expected according to their availability. ANOSIM analysis showed significant differences between sites in DS and WS diets. Our study evidenced that the Italian hare behaved as generalist, revealing its capability for exploiting several plant species and to adapt its diet preferences to space-time variation of food availability.