Vegetation of open habitats in the British National Vegetation Classification system

This article gives an overview of the plant communities formed by vegetation of open habitats in the British National Vegetation Classification system.

Introduction

The open habitat communities of the NVC were described in Volume 5 of British Plant Communities, first published in 2000, along with the three groups of maritime communities (shingle, strandline and sand-dune communities, salt-marsh communities and maritime cliff communities).

In total, 42 open habitat communities have been identified.

The open habitat communities consist of eight distinct subgroups:

six arable weed and trackside communities of light, less-fertile acid soils (OV1, OV2, OV3, OV4, OV5 and OV6)
eight arable weed and wasteland communities of fertile loams and clays (OV7, OV8, OV9, OV10, OV11, OV12, OV13 and OV14)
three arable weed communities of light, limey soils (OV15, OV16 and OV17)
six gateway, trackside and courtyard communities (OV18, OV19, OV20, OV21, OV22 and OV23)
four tall-herb weed communities (OV24, OV25, OV26 and OV27)
five communities typical of periodically inundated habitats (OV28, OV29, OV30, OV32 and OV33)
four dwarf-rush communities of ephemeral ponds (OV31, OV34, OV35 and OV36)
six communities of crevice, scree and spoil vegetation (OV37, OV38, OV39, OV40, OV41 and OV42)

The following is a list of the communities that make up this category: