3.1 Clonal characteristics and spatial architectures of diploid
and tetraploid
The average number of buds on each diploid rhizome was 2.120, and the
variance of buds was 0.277 (Table 2, 3). For the tetraploids, the
average number and the variance of buds per rhizome was 2.315 and 0.408,
respectively. For the proportion of active buds to total buds, it was
0.627 for the diploid and 0.473 for the tetraploid. The ratio of dormant
buds to total buds for the diploid was 0.357, while it was 0.522 for the
tetraploid. The extrema values of buds per rhizome for the diploids and
tetraploids were same; both the minimum value = 1 and the maximum value
= 4. These results revealed that the tetraploids possessed more rhizome
buds; however, the number of active buds were lower (dormant buds were
higher) than that in the diploids (Table 1). In addition, one-way ANOVA
analysis showed that the above indexes, such as ratio of dormant buds to
total buds, the ratio of active buds to total buds, and the ratio of
dormant buds to active buds, were significantly different among diploid
and tetraploid of C. udensis (P<0.05) (Table 3).
The rhizome styles of the diploids
and tetraploids were primarily zigzagged, C, V, and Y (Fig. 2); the
”one” style was very rare. The spatial positions between the buds of
each rhizome were basically a symmetrical distribution when there were
two buds, or formed 90° angles when having 3-4 buds.
The length of rhizome internode was about 1-2cm. Based on our
observation, the rhizome bud usually occurred in the rhizome node, and
was thought as the ramet produced by the genet. Moreover, the rhizome
nodes of some individuals had a special branch architecture. The number
of branches was typically from one to four, with the highest frequency
of single branches. Additional branches were typically observed for
older plants (Fig. 2).
Statistical analysis of the clone reproduction for C. udensis in
that year revealed that the number of ramets produced by the diploid and
tetraploid individuals was minimal, and the ratio of clone individuals
between the diploid and the tetraploid were both relative lower (Table
3). Thus, the C. udensis clone growth pattern was the phalanx
growth form (Fig. 3).