Abstract
Studies of plant phenology have been performed predominantly with terrestrial species and rarely so with aquatic communities. Such plants are fundamental for the aquatic ecosystems, representing a valuable source of resources when they are scarce in terrestrial environments for the fauna. Studies of phenology help to understand the reproduction rhythms of plant communities and provide fundamental support to management and conservation. This study aimed to describe the reproductive phenology of 15 species of aquatic plants and determine how it is related to climatic factors and physicochemical variables of water. Plants were collected every 15 days throughout a single year, from two ponds in the Cerrado-Pantanal ecotone, Central-West Brazil. Species were observed in flower and fruit throughout the year with varying phenophases among life forms (amphibious, emergent, rooted, floating and rooted submerged). Photoperiod stood out among climatic variables for flowering and fruiting times. Phenophases were explained by climatic factors, as well as by physicochemical variables of the water. Nitrogen and pH were the variables most related to the highest number of phenophases of different life forms. Such information is relevant to understanding how physicochemical alterations to water by pollution, eutrophication and siltation, among others, can change the phenology of aquatic macrophytes.
Highlights
Phenology is the study of the temporal occurrence of phases or activities of plants or animals’ life cycle over the year (Morellato 1995)
The climatic data for the study period were obtained from CEMTEC-MS and the meteorological station of the Universidade Estadual de Mato Grosso do Sul; the photoperiod data were gathered on the On-line Photoperiod Calculator (Lammi 2001)
The occurrence of species in flowering and fructification throughout the year in the studied assemblage can be explained by the presence of different life forms with distinct substrates of nutrient absorption and resource obtention strategies (Irgang et al 1984; Pott & Pott 2000) in the studied areas
Summary
Phenology is the study of the temporal occurrence of phases or activities of plants or animals’ life cycle over the year (Morellato 1995). Information on phenology are available and have increased lately on distinct Brazilian domains, such as Cerrado (Mantovani & Martins 1988; Batalha et al 1997; Batalha & Mantovani 2000; Batalha & Martins 2004; Tannus et al 2006), Caatinga (Barbosa et al 2003; Araújo et al 2011), Atlantic Forest (Morellato & Haddad 2000; Morellato et al 2000; Pereira et al 2008; Freire et al 2013), Amazon Forest (Pinto et al 2008) and Pantanal (Fava et al 2011; Neves & Damasceno-Júnior 2011; Freitas et al 2013; Lima & Damasceno-Junior 2020) Those studies encompass trees, shrubs and herbs, mainly from terrestrial environments. The Pantanal, rich in aquatic environments, has a high diversity of aquatic plants but phenological studies for this group are yet incipient (available for less than 2 % of the species), though necessary (Aoki et al in press)
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