oligocratic

English

Adjective

oligocratic (comparative more oligocratic, superlative most oligocratic)

1. Of or relating to oligocracy.

Noun

oligocratic (uncountable)

1. (ecology) The third and penultimate stage of interglacial forest development (Late-Temperate), characterized by shade-tolerant species that tolerate leaching of the soil.
   • 1982, John D. Hamaker, Donald A. Weaver, The Survival of Civilization Depends Upon Our Solving Three Problems, page 64:

     Significantly, his pollen deposits reveal the conditions both in the oligocratic and the telocratic .

   • 2004, Richard John Huggett, Fundamentals of Biogeography, page 319:

     During the first part of the oligocratic stage, leaching of brown soils produces acid podzols that favour coniferous woodlands and heaths.

   • 2012, M. Ingrouille, Historical Ecology of the British Flora, page 76:

     Carpinus (hornbeam) behaved much more strongly as an oligocratic species than before; its pollen frequency not rising until quite late in the stage.

   • 2014, Antoinette Mannion, Global Environmental Change, page 71:

     Palaeoenvironmental evidence from northwest Europe indicates that the oligocratic phase of the interglacial cycle (Fig. 3.1) had begun by ca. 5K years BP.

Coordinate terms

• cryocratic
• protocratic
• mesocratic
• telocratic