The Mediterranean Ammophiletea Database: a comprehensive dataset of coastal dune vegetation

This paper introduces the Mediterranean Ammophiletea Database (GIVD ID: EU-00-016), reporting history of data collection, current content and further development of this new research infrastructure for coastal dune vegetation. The main aim was to compile, in a unique repository, vegetation plot data of psammophilous herbaceous communities (Ammophiletea and Helichryso-Crucianelletea maritimae phytosociological classes) from Southern Europe and Northern Africa. In 2016 the database contained 7,769 releves and 1,586 species from the Mediterranean basin, the South Atlantic side of Europe (Morocco, Portugal and Spain) and the Black Sea. A total of 200 bibliographic references were used to digitize phytosociological releves currently stored in Turboveg software. Most plots were georeferenced to a precision of < 1 km. 80% of the plots include information about plot size and 74% about total cover of the sampled communities. The database is registered in the Global Index of Vegetation Database (GIVD) and is available by request through the European Vegetation Archive (EVA).