Affiliation:
1. Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research-UFZ, Department of Community Ecology, Theodor-Lieser-Str. 4, 06120 Halle, Germany.
Abstract
In agricultural habitats, selection may favour plants that show a pronounced ability to tolerate stress induced by specific management methods. However, genetic erosion associated with habitat fragmentation may diminish this ability. To assess the role of mowing as a selection pressure and the impact of fragmentation processes on the ability to tolerate foliage loss, we grew 215 plants of the perennial herb Sanguisorba officinalis L. originating from 16 differently sized populations, located in mown meadows and successional fallows, in a common environment, and measured their performance and response to defoliation. Plants from meadows and fallows neither differed in performance characters nor in their ability to compensate for foliage loss. However, independently from the habitat of origin, populations slightly differed in performance. This variation was not due to differences in population size, plant density, or level of genetic variation, indicating its independence from genetic erosion, which may go along with habitat fragmentation. Rather, these differences between populations appear to be the outcome of unknown selection pressures or random genetic drift. Plants from successional fallows retain their potential to cope with mowing, presumably due to the low generation turnover of the perennial species. Selection by mowing may act over time scales larger than those reflected by the developmental stage of the current habitats.
Publisher
Canadian Science Publishing
Subject
Plant Science,Ecology,Ecology, Evolution, Behavior and Systematics
Cited by
3 articles.
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