Differentiation of Scots pine populations in the belt pine forests of Altai Krai discovered with markers of various nature

Abstract

In the territory of steppe zone of Ob’-Irtysh interfluve it was studied the differentiation of scots pine populations of belt forests with use of allozyme’s, phene’s and morphometric markers. Here allocated 2 forest-seed zoning and border between them practically coincides with border between Siberian and Kulunda pine subspecies on L. F. Pravdin’s classification. Allozyme’s analysis didn’t reveal significant differentiation of stands, except for rare differences between some of them and a slight trend for decrease in effective number of alleles in the more southern populations. The analysis of a molecular variance (AMOVA) also shows absence of differentiation of populations from different forest-seed zoning. Differentiation of populations by using phenes (coloring of seeds, type of cone’s apophysis) and high-inherited morphometric characters (index form of cones and weight of 1000 seeds) was more effective at comparing populations on both levels – between and within forest-seed zoning. It allowed revealing of reliable distinctions between populations in almost 82 % of cases of total number of the compared couples of populations, thus extent of differentiation using the allozyme’s markers is almost three times lower. The assessment of population structure of pine in tape forest of Altai region, which is carried out with application of a complex of markers, indicates between-populations heterogeneity in this part of area. The received results confirm the expediency of complex researches of population structure of forest-forming species and the necessity of more precise definition of forest-seed zoning of a scots pine in the studied territory.