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Reproductive strategies involving biomass allocation, reproductive phenology and seed production in two Asteraceae herbs growing in karst soil varying in depth and water availability

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Abstract

Shallow soil with low water availability, poor nutrition, and limited living space is the key limiting factor of plant growth and reproduction in vulnerable karst regions. As pioneers adapted to these areas, little is known about the reproductive responses of annual herbs to these limited soil resources. In this study, we, therefore, investigated the reproductive strategies (“fight or flight”) of two annual Asteraceae herbs (Xanthium sibiricum and Bidens pilosa) growing in the harsh karst soil environment, by comprehensively considering biomass allocation, reproductive phenology, and seed production. X. sibiricum and B. pilosa were grown under three soil depths and three water availability levels in a full two-way randomized block design, then biomass allocation, initial flowering time, fruiting stage, life span and seed number and mass were examined. In X. sibiricum, reproductive allocation decreased with decreasing water availability, soil depth, and water availability + soil depth. Meanwhile, the initial flowering time, fruiting stage and life span were all delayed with moderate decreases in resources. However, in B. pilosa, reproductive allocation increased with decreasing soil resources, while initial flowering time, fruiting stage and life span remained unchanged under moderate resource decline. Under severe resource decline, both species showed a reduction in fruiting stage and life span. These results support the hypothesis that X. sibiricum tends to adopt a “fight” reproductive strategy in response to declining resources via changes in biomass allocation, reproductive phenology and seed production. In contrast, B. pilosa tends to adopt a “flight” strategy in terms of biomass allocation, while maintaining a relatively stable reproductive phenology and seed size to cope with the harsh living conditions. However, neither species coped well under severe declines in water availability, nutrition and living space. These findings help our understanding of how herbaceous plants can adjust their reproductive strategies to support their regeneration in harsh karst soil environments.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Mr. LH Zhou for caring for the seedlings in our ecological garden. We would also like to thank Prof. Dr. JHC Cornelissen and XY Xiang for useful suggestions and proofreading of the text. This study was financially supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of Chongqing (cstc2020jcyj-msxmX0244) and Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (XDJK 2020B037) awarded to JC Liu and the National Key R&D Program of China (2016YFC0502304) awarded to JP Tao.

Funding

This study was financially supported by grants from National Natural Science Foundation of Chongqing (cstc2020jcyj-msxmX0244) and Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (XDJK 2020B037) to JC Liu, and National Key R&D Program of China (2016YFC0502304) to JP Tao.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Eco-Environments in Three Gorges Reservoir Region (Ministry of Education), Chongqing Key Laboratory of Plant Ecology and Resources Research in Three Gorges Reservoir Region, School of Life Sciences, Southwest University, Tiansheng Road No.1, Beibei, Chongqing, 400715, China

    Suhui Li, Junting Liu, Jinming Li, Yulu Deng, Jinyi Chen, Jiamin Wang, Haiyan Song, Jing Zhang, Jianping Tao & Jinchun Liu

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  1. Suhui Li
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  2. Junting Liu
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  3. Jinming Li
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  4. Yulu Deng
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Contributions

LSH, LJC, and TJP conceived the ideas and designed methodology; LSH, SHY, and ZJ collected the data; WJM and CJY analyzed the data, LSH, LJC, LJM, LJT, and DYL co-wrote the manuscript. All authors contributed critically to the drafts and approved the final version of the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Jinchun Liu.

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Communicated by Carissa Lyn Wonkka.

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Li, S., Liu, J., Li, J. et al. Reproductive strategies involving biomass allocation, reproductive phenology and seed production in two Asteraceae herbs growing in karst soil varying in depth and water availability. Plant Ecol 222, 737–747 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11258-021-01141-5

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