Anatomical differences between Pinus mugs Truro populations from the Tarts Mts.. expressed in needle traits and in needle and cone traits together

Abstract

Two-year-old needles were collected from 429 individuals of dwarf mountain pine (<em>Pius mugn</em> Turra) from 10 populations of this species growing in the Tatra Mts. (5 populations from calcareous and 5 from calcium-free undersoil). Thirteen anatomical traits of the needles were studied. For obtaining a full picture of the variability of the dwarf mountain pine, the differences were investigated in ten populations (385 plants) as regards 27 traits of needles and cones. The data obtained by measurements served as basis for performing multivariate analysis of variance and testing the statistical hypotheses, for discriminant analysis, calculation of the Mahalanobis distances and construction of a minimum spanning tree of the shortest Mahalanobis distances and agglumerative clustering by the method of' nearest neighbourhood. The results of these analyses indicated that the dwarf mountain pine populations differ ,statistically significantly as regards the whole complex of needle traits and form three groups not correlated with the type of undersoil on which they grow. Most closely similar are the populations from Kominy Tylkowe, Morskie Oko and Wyżni Toporowy Staw. The population from Kobylarz is the most diverse. Investigation of' the differences in the complex of' needle and cone traits proved that the traits of cones are decisive for the variability picture.