Taxonomic and geographic differentiation of Pinus mugo complex on the needle characteristics

Abstract

The phenotypic differentiation of Pinus mugo complex was verified using 31 populations of P. mugo sensu stricto, 11 of P. uncinata, five of P. uliginosa, one of the potential hybrids P. uliginosa × P. mugo and three of P. sylvestris, the latter as a control. The 22 morphological and anatomical needle characteristics were measured and statistically examined to describe the taxa and the population within the taxa differentiation. All the taxa of the P. mugo complex differed significantly from P. sylvestris in most of the verified needle characteristics. Within P. mugo complex, populations of P. uncinata were clearly distinguished from P. mugo s. s. The population of potential hybrid origin was the most similar to P. uliginosa. Populations of the latter taxon were strongly differentiated; some of them were closer to P. uncinata, and others to P. mugo s. s. Within the whole sampled data, three geographic groups of populations were detected: the first included P. uncinata and two of P. uliginosa, the second contained East and South Carpathian P. mugo s. s. with the presumed hybrid population, and the third contained all the other populations of P. mugo s. s. and P. uliginosa. Within P. mugo s. s., the Sudetan populations formed a separate group. Pinus uncinata from the Pyrenees reflected a high level of differentiation. The marginal populations of this taxon (Cebollera, Gúdar, Massif Central) also differed from those in the Pyrenees. The phenotypic differentiation of taxa and populations appeared similar to that which was detected based on cpDNA markers.

Key words:

• biogeography
• biometrics
• discrimination analysis
• Euclidean distance
• needle anatomy
• needle morphology
• PCA
• plant taxonomy
• plant variation

Acknowledgements

We would like to express our great thanks to J.M. Montserrat and A.M. Romo from the Institute of Botany of Barcelona, to C. Farkas from the Brasov Forest Faculty, Romania, Ya. Didukh from the Institute of Botany of the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences in Kiev, and the authorities of Karkonosze and Tatra National Parks for their valuable help during field work, which made possible several visits to particular mountain massifs and enabled the collection of material.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Supplemental data

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Associate Editor: Nadia Bystriakova

Additional information

Funding

The research was financially supported partly by the Polish Ministry of Science (under grants No. 2P04C 018 29, 6P04G 06016, 2P06L 04628 and NN303 360535) and partly by the Institute of Dendrology (Poland) (under statutory activity).