Surface wax components in species and hybrids of cortaderia

Abstract

Analyses of the alkanes and triterpene methyl ethers present in the surface waxes of a New Zealand indigenous species of Cortaderia (Gramineae, as yet formally undescribed), of C. araucana from South America, and of F 1 interspecific hybrids involving C. fulvida, C. richardii, and C. toetoe are reported. Alkane distribution patterns show, as reported previously, a distinction between New Zealand and South American species in that the latter show a higher ratio of C 31 n-alkanes to C 29 n-alkanes than do New Zealand species. F 1 interspecific hybrids have the characteristic New Zealand pattern. The results of our further triterpene methyl ether analyses reveal that these compounds do occur in Cortaderia from South America, and that New Zealand species may lack them; this in contradiction of our earlier findings. F 1 hybrids among New Zealand species produce arundoin; the biosynthesis of the methyl ethers of α- and β-amyrin is suppressed in F 1 C. richardii × C. toetoe. Cylindrin (isoarborinol methyl ether) is recorded for the first time in Cortaderia, in C. araucana where it co-occurs with arundoin.