In a 2005 and 2007 study by L. Galloway, the maternal light environment of Campanulastrum americanum was shown to influence the offspring’s germination season by altering the maternal flowering time. C. americanum, also known as the American bellflower, is a native understory fern. Individuals can grow in either the forest understory or in light gaps, therefore, individuals will experience no direct sunlight, or full sunlight for some length of time, daily. Individuals within the C. americanum species are capable of having one of two life-history strategies. The relationship between maternal light environment and flowering time can influence the offspring’s life-history strategy by dictating whether the individuals grow as annuals or biennials. A majority of seeds in light gaps became annuals, germinating in the fall and flowering immediately the next summer, while a majority of the understory seeds grew as biennial individuals, germinating in the spring and growing for a season before flowering their second year. As the study results support, these flowering phenologies are two different life-history strategies that have been influenced by maternal effects. The study results have shown that twice as many seeds germinated in light gaps if their mother had grown within the gap, and that twice as many seeds germinated in the understory if their mother had also grown there. The population growth for individuals grown outside of their mother’s environment was determined to be
C-Fern plants are a strain of Ceratopteris richardii and have a rapid reproductive cycle, making them perfect subjects in lab to be tested and observed on population genetics. Population genetics is the study of genetic variation and allelic frequencies on a specific group over an amount of time. It is a great way to predict future genetic information on more than just the C-Ferns. In this experiment, two different generations for gametophytes and sporophytes of C-Ferns were observed and counted for the amount of wild type and polka dot mutant individuals within a sample and a population. The overall results demonstrated a 1:1 ratio of mutant to wild type in the F1 gametophyte generation for both the sample and population, which was expected. The F1 sporophyte generation demonstrated a 1:1 ratio of mutant to wild type in the sample and a 2:1 ratio of mutant to wild type in the population. A 3:1 ratio of mutant to wild type was expected in the sporophytes. It was concluded that the polka dot mutant is recessive in sporophytes and demonstrates random fertilization in the diploid stage, but not in gametophytes. This process of population genetics in C-Ferns can be extremely beneficial in other organisms, such as humans. Population genetics could be a tool in medicine in determining human
The “Brassica rapa” is a fast plant known as the field mustard. This plant is well known for its rapid growing rate, which makes it an easy breeding cycle and easy to pollinate. In giving so this makes “Brassica rapa” a great participant for testing Gregor Mendel’s theories of inheritance. The “Brassica rapa” acts like a test subject in testing cross-pollination giving the understanding to the dominant allele of colored stems. There are different colors that are visible on the stem that are above the soil; the colors vary from green to purple. P1 seed was ordered, germinated and cross-pollinated until germination of the next off spring of plants were also done. It was
Identify features of flowers of native species of angiosperms that may be adaptations for wind, insect, bird and mammal pollination.
Spruce budworm (Choristoneura fumiferana (Clemens)) outbreaks have an important effect on succession of balsam fir (Abies balsamea (L.) Mill.) and spruce (Picea spp.) stands in eastern Canadian forests (MacLean 2004). Spruce budworm feeds repeatedly on annual shoots of balsam fir and spruce and leads to large-scale growth reduction and mortality (MacLean and Ostaff 1989). When overstory tree mortality occurs from defoliation, it creates gaps that allow understory plants to get an opportunity to release (Osawa 1994; Kemball et al. 2005). Defoliation also changes the competitive interactions between host fir-spruce and non-host species and may release the latter.
Ceratopteris richardii, known as a C-fern has a lifecycle referred to as alteration of generations, which consist of neither haploid nor diploid dominant. C-ferns are homospours plants which are important in that they can produce hermaphrioditic gametophytes in order to be able to self fertilize. However, some of the homospourous C-ferns only produce male gametophytes .The life cycle of Ceratopteris richardii starts as a diploid sporophyte which then, by meiosis, produces haploid spores. These spores then undergo mitosis to produce a haploid gametophyte, which can be either hermaphrodite( producing eggs and
Ms Halvorsen Ferns contacted the GAO expressing concerns about her grandchildren, specially the oldest one, Nicholas (13years old) who has suicidal thoughts. Her daughter, Amanda Bringar, who is the mother of her grandchildren is using drugs and alcohol, dedicated to prostitution, and she brings different dangerous partners to home, where she resides with her children. Ms Halvorsen Ferns is also concerns that Amanda has loaded firearms in her home.
Germination of seeds, and early stages of growth are important determinants in interspecies competition (Mangla et al. 2011). Higher proportions of B. gracilis seedlings to B.rapa will allow B. gracilis to gain an advantage both in germination, and in development of its roots and shoots. B. gracilis can then establish itself and sequester resources (water, sunlight soil nutrients) for growth and survival before B. rapa. Additionally, it was predicted that the mean biomass (root and shoot) of B. gracilis would increase as the ratio of B. gracilis to B. rapa increased. Multiple roots of long length in B. gracilis will be favoured as they can better compete in water and nutrient acquisition against B. rapa (Craine and Dybzinski 2013). Increased ability to acquire nutrients thereby increases the availability of nutrients B. gracillis has to grow, increasing shoot length and thickness. On this basis, the mean height of B. gracilis was predicted to increase as the ratio of B. gracilis to B. rapa increased as
Wingstem (Verbesina alternifolia) are an unbranched perennial plant that are primarily located in middle and eastern areas of North America. Wingstem grow in habitats that receive large amounts of sun and areas that are shaded. Wingstem thrive in areas with moist conditions, and receive periodic rainfall. Based on our knowledge of the chemical processes in plants, the Wingstem located in the sunlit areas will have greater reproduction, resulting in increased flowering rather than those in shaded locations. To test our hypothesis, we collected Wingstem in various habitats (sun and shaded). We then calculated the number of flowers, followed by weighing the total vegetation. The results demonstrate a significant difference between the number
Ecological tradeoffs occur throughout a species’ lifespan, giving little energy to one or more characteristics in order to focus energy and attention on a separate characteristic. Three common characteristics found in an ecological tradeoff include fecundity, age of reproductive maturity, and juvenile survivorship. Juvenile survivorship is important, especially to Silver maple (Acer saccharinum) because a species must have an adequate survival level to not become extinct (Molles 2010). One way tree fruits have a juvenile survivorship is because of the varying seed dispersal methods with which they find new ground to germinate. Secondary seed dispersal describes the process when other organisms pick up, intentionally or not, the seeds and carry them off to a new location to begin growing. Wind dispersion the most common dispersal method among silver maple samaras, incorporating the specialized design of the samara’s seed coat (CITE).
Resource allocation as a result of herbivory has been predicted in plants, but of late has only been investigated. One way to determine resource allocation as a defense to herbivory is to measure both above ground and belowground biomass and calculate root:shoot ratio as an indicator of resource allocation. This study investigated the induced pattern of defense of resource allocation to root:shoot ratio as a response to simulated mechanical herbivory. Monarch butterfly larvae herbivory were simulated through mechanical herbivory of four treatments. It was found that there was a significant difference between species, but there were no significant differences between treatments. This study examines the divergent evolution in three species of milkweed responses to herbivory.
The deciduous forests of West Virginia, like all ecosystems, are diverse homes to numerous organisms interacting with each other. West Virginia University’s Core Arboretum provides a good representation of this diversity, providing a wide spectrum of interspecies interaction. For example, when the upper canopy of a forest grows its leaves it absorbs more sunlight, leaving the plants closer to the forest floor with about 2% of the emitted sunlight. To adapt to this, species will flower in a small window of time early in the spring season before the upper canopy becomes profuse. These species are called spring ephemerals. Some of the ephemeral species observed in the arboretum, such as the Viola pubescens, had not yet reached their window and did not contain a flower. Alternatively, species such as the Sangunaria Canadensis (Figure 1), had exceeded their window and completed its reproduction phase leaving no flower to be seen. While there are plenty of species within the arboretum worth mentioning, only a few will be reflected upon, starting with Sangunaria canadensis.
Land plants can be divided into three different groups. One of these groups are nonvascular plants which include liverworts, hornworts, and mosses. The other two which are the focus of this paper are vascular seedless plants and vascular seed plants. The difference between vascular and nonvascular plants is that vascular plants have vascular tissue which enables them to grow up and be bigger than nonvascular plants. The difference between seed and seedless vascular plants is the presence of a seed. A seed is defined by the 10th Edition of Campbell Biology as “an adaption of some terrestrial plants consisting of an embryo packaged along with a store of food within a protective coat.” This includes anything from apple seeds to dandelion seeds. The absence or presence of a seed changes how a plant reproduces and also leads to different advantages and disadvantages to the plant.
In such cases the dormancy of plants is evidently caused by the unfavorable external conditions and in that case it is called imposed or enforced dormancy. However, in many cases the unfavourable conditions are not directly the cause of dormancy. Thus, many trees form winter-resting buds during the summer and autumn, when the temperatures and light conditions are still favorable, and long in advance of the onset of winter.
The mean of superior lines (Table 4) showed that a specific pure line with high values for all traits not found; but desirable pure lines in terms of phenological traits, stem diameter, number of pods per plant, plant height and seed yield were observed. Line No. 20 (ILL590) with large leaf length, high numbers of pods per plant, more stem diameter, fewer days to flowering and maturity and high seed yield known as the superior line on weather conditions of Shahrekord, Iran. After that, line No. 28 (ILL947) was with high levels of seed yield, stem diameter, number of pods per
- The dates of bud break and full bloom in both cultivars in both areas advanced earlier by 1.0 – 2.3 days.