Morphological integration between seeds and seedlings ofHymenaea courbaril

Abstract

ABSTRACTMorphological integrations are unknown to forestry seeds. Understanding if seed measurements could predict its future seedlings features is a central question in seedling production.Hymenaea courbarilis an important species in this context and to the applied forestry. Thus, this study aimed to understand how some seedling features, could be related to the seed weight, and be affected by the population origin. The measurements consisted of seedling collar diameter, weight, protophilus area, central and lateral vein. Seed weight consistently varied between the populations in the study. Both populations had higher weight ranges than mentioned in the literature. There was no strong evidence that greater seed weight requires lesser time to germinate, conflicting with previous information. All the measurements presented enough shreds of evidence to be considered different when comparing the populations, except for the protophilus area and lateral vein length. All the studied measurements presented low correlation indexes to seed weight, except for seedling collar diameter, and seedling weight, which presented a moderate correlation. Protophilus elongation pattern was strongly associated with the leaf width when compared to midvein.