Differential growth rate, water use efficiency and climate sensitivity between males and females of Ilex aquifolium in north-western Spain.

Background And Aims: Dioecious plant species, i.e., those in which male and female functions are housed in different individuals, are particularly vulnerable to global environmental changes.

Salt tolerance in a neotropical orchid in the absence of local adaptation to salt spray.

Premise: Salt tolerance has rarely been investigated regionally in the neotropics and even more rarely in Orchidaceae, one of the largest families. Therefore, investigating local adaptation to salt spray and its physiological basis in Epidendrum fulgens, a neotropical orchid species, brings important new insights.

Methods: We assessed the degree of salt tolerance in E.

Two novel PCR-based assays for sexing of and plants.

and are model systems in studies of plant reproduction, chromosome evolution and sexual dimorphism, but sexing of plants based on morphology is only possible from flowering stage onwards. Both species show homogametic females (XX) and heterogametic males (XY).•Here we developed two assays (primer pairs and ) for molecular sexing of and , targeting length polymorphisms between the X and Y-linked copies of the spermidine synthase gene.

No difference in plasticity between different ploidy levels in the Mediterranean herb Mercurialis annua.

Increased phenotypic plasticity for a number of plant traits has been suggested as a possible reason for the success and spread of polyploids. One such trait is a plant's sex allocation (or gender), which influences its reproductive success directly as a function of the potentially heterogeneous mating prospects in the population. However, it is unknown how polyploidy per se might affect plasticity in a plant's sex allocation.

Do plants adjust their sex allocation and secondary sexual morphology in response to their neighbours?

Background And Aims: Changes in the sex allocation (i.e. in pollen versus seed production) of hermaphroditic plants often occur in response to the environment.

Soil water content and patterns of allocation to below- and above-ground biomass in the sexes of the subdioecious plant Honckenya peploides.

Background And Aims: Dioecious plants often show sex-specific differences in growth and biomass allocation. These differences have been explained as a consequence of the different reproductive functions performed by the sexes. Empirical evidence strongly supports a greater reproductive investment in females.

Sex-differential herbivory in androdioecious Mercurialis annua.

Males of plants with separate sexes are often more prone to attack by herbivores than females. A common explanation for this pattern is that individuals with a greater male function suffer more from herbivory because they grow more quickly, drawing more heavily on resources for growth that might otherwise be allocated to defence. Here, we test this 'faster-sex' hypothesis in a species in which males in fact grow more slowly than hermaphrodites, the wind-pollinated annual herb Mercurialis annua.

Sexual dimorphism in resource acquisition and deployment: both size and timing matter.

Background And Aims: The males and females of many dioecious plant species differ from one another in important life-history traits, such as their size. If male and female reproductive functions draw on different resources, for example, one should expect males and females to display different allocation strategies as they grow. Importantly, these strategies may differ not only between the two sexes, but also between plants of different age and therefore size.

Reduced inbreeding depression after species range expansion.

Many species expanded their geographic ranges from core "refugium" populations when the global climate warmed after the Pleistocene. The bottlenecks that occur during such range expansions diminish genetic variation in marginal populations, rendering them less responsive to selection. Here, we show that range expansion also strongly depletes inbreeding depression.