The Vascular Flora and Vegetation of Western Isle of Wight County, Virginia

The vascular flora and arborescent vegetation of a 90 km2 area of western Isle of Wight County were studied. Located on the southeastern Coastal Plain of Virginia, the study area lies on the Isle of Wight Plain along the Blackwater River, and surrounds the last remnant of longleaf pine-turkey oak pine barrens in Virginia. It also lies in the transition zone between the Southern Mixed Hardwood Forest of the Southeast and the Oak-Hickory-Pine Forest of the Middle Atlantic Coast. Vegetational analysis of representative forest types in the area was completed using the Bitterlich-circular quadrat sampling method. The present study suggests that the region is characterized by a more southern flora and vegetation than areas only slightly to the north (e.g., the Virginia Peninsula). Six hundred and four species representing 357 genera in 113 families of plants were documented. Sixty-eight of these were newly recorded for the county, and three of these were records for the southeastern Coastal Plain of Virginia. Nine of the species are very rare to extremely rare in the state, and seventeen others are rare to uncommon.