Genetic variation in Siberian stone pine (Pinus sibirica Du Tour) group and individuals seedlings from the south of Western Siberia forest zone

Abstract

In forests with the participation of Siberian stone pine, you can often find group seedlings - young plants grow in groups, closely adjacent to each other. The reason for this is the zoochoric method of spreading Siberian stone pine seeds - group seedlings appear from seeds hidden by nutcracker in the ground cover. The article presents the results of analysis of 23 allozyme loci variation in 141 Siberian Stone pine seedlings (16 samples of group seedlings, and a sample of 16 individually growing young plants). Young plants growing individually had, on average, a higher proportion of polymorphic loci and an average number of alleles per locus (P99% = 43.48 %, NA = 1.5) compared with the group seedlings (P99% = 23.37 %, Na = 1.25). The average value of pairwise relatedness coefficients WEst in a group of individually growing young plants WEst = -0.166, for samples of group seedlings WEst = 0.206. 12 samples of group seedlings had average WEst > 0, nine samples 0.25 < WEst < 0.5, i.e. more than half of the studied samples of group seedlings are represented by a mixture of sibs and halfsibs offspring. The zoochoric type of distribution has a significant impact on the structure of variability in Siberian stone pine seedlings in populations of southern part of the Western Siberia forest zone.