Spatial distribution of flower colour polymorphism in Iris lutescens

Abstract

ABSTRACT Iris lutescensis a common species occurring mainly in dry limestone habitats in Western Italy, Southern France, and Spain. The species shows a remarkable polymorphism for flower colour, and yellow and purple flowers can be found in the same population. As the species is a deceptive one, the previous studies on the maintenance of such a polymorphism were linked to its pollination ecology. Here, I reported on the spatial distribution of the polymorphism and showed that Spanish populations are mostly purple monomorphic. In contrast, populations in the South of France and Italy show the complete range, from 0 to 1, for the frequency of yellow morph, and the spatial autocorrelation for morph frequencies is very low. To go further, correlations between morph frequencies and abiotic factors, such as bioclimatic variables, UV irradiance, and aridity, were studied. On the whole, the spatial distribution of the frequency of yellow morph can be hardly explained by the contributions of these abiotic variables, and historical contingencies, including the phylogeography of the species have to be invoked, in particular, to explain the absence of polymorphic populations in Spain.