Introducing Flora, Life Form and Geographical Distribution of Plants inBon ChenarZone of Ashtian (Markazi Province)

Identifying the vegetation cover and analyzing the geographical distribution of plants in any region provide the basis for ecological examinations in that region. The purpose of this study was to introduce floristic list, life forms and geographic distribution of plants in Bon Chenarregion. This region,spreading over 1800 hectares, is located 10 km from the north west of Ashtian. The results showed that the 265 plant species that exist in the region belong to 45 families and 176 genera. Of a total of 176 genera, 26 genera (14.86%) and 44 species (16.67%) belong to monocotyledons class, 149 genera (85.14%) and 220 species (83.3%) belong to dicotyledons class and onegenus (0.6%) and one species (0.38%) belong to Gymnosperm. The families with the highest number of species wereAsteraceae(43 species), Papilionaceae(27 species), Gramineae(22 species), Lamiaceae(20 species), Apiaceae(19 species) and Liliaceae(16 species). Astragalus (15 species) and Cousinia and Echinops (each with 5 species) genera have the highest species. Analyzing the geographical distribution of the plants in this region indicated that Iranian-Turanian,Iranian-Turanian/ Mediterranean and Iranian-Turanian/ Europea-Siberiavegetation areashave the highest number of species respectively with 193 (72.8 %), 19 (7.17 %) and 16 (6.03 %) species. From among the plants in the region,hemicryptophytes with 127 species (47.9%), therophytes with 63 species (23.7%) and Geophytes with 36 species (13.58%) comprised the most important life forms.