The character and differential species of Abies koreana community, a subalpine coniferous forest, on Mt. Halla and its vegetation unit were reviewed, based on literature published up to date. Song and Nakanish (1985a) originally described Saso-Abietetum koreanae Song et Nakanishi 1985 for the community. At that time, we were fully justified in establshing the nomenclature. Nevertheless, against this nomenclature, Yim and Kim (1990) made a objection, and it was renamed as what is called Saso quelpaertensi-Abietetum koreanae (Song et Nakanishi) corr. Yim et Kim 1990. In their previous study(Yim et al., 1990) being the root of the nomenclature, however, they did not study on the full layers containing the moss layer of bryophyte and lichen for the stratification of the Abies koreana community, in spite of the importance of the species of moss layer for the selection of character and differential species of vegetation units belonging to Vaccinio-Piceetea Br.-Bl. 1939, and also the floristic composition from their study was not compared with that of the vegetation units of the subalpine coniferous forests in Korean Peninsula, Japan, Maritime Province of Siberia and Northeast China. Among the four character species selected by them, it is clear that Maianthemum bifolim and Lonicera maackii are species no having the characteristic value from the phytosociological viewpoint. Besides, Sasa quelpaertensis described in their nomenclature is a synonym of S. palmata (Suzuki, 1978). Therefore, their nomenclature is invalid and comes under a contravention (Infringement of Priority) to the Code of Phytosociological Nomenclature (Barkaman et al., 1986).
Saso-Abietetum koreanae was amply justified also by author´s recent study (Song, 1991) examined throughout the range of subalpine coniferous forest in Korea. With the discussion of justification of Saso-Abietetum koreanae, a association was brought in the present review.
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