The genus Pelargonium (Geraniaceae) exhibits tremendous variation in growth form. We apply a broadly defined concept of Bauplan in our study of growth form, architectural and anatomical features of early seedling development in the type subgenus. We analyze variation in these features within a phylogenetic framework based on sequence comparisons of internal transcribed spacer regions (ITS) of n...

Vegetation trampling resulting from recreation can adversely impact natural habitats, leading to the loss of vegetation and the degradation of plant communities. A considerable primary literature exists on this topic, therefore it is important to assess whether this accumulated evidence can be used to reach general conclusions concerning vegetation vulnerability to inform conservation managemen...

BACKGROUND A number of biotic and abiotic factors have been proposed as drivers of geographic variation in species richness. As biotic elements, inter-specific interactions are the most widely recognized. Among abiotic factors, in particular for plants, climate and topographic variables as well as their historical variation have been correlated with species richness and endemism. In this study,...

Edaphic properties have been widely shown to influence community composition and distribution. However, the degree which edaphic factors can affect grasses in semi-arid lowlands is still little researched. We assessed significance of nine explain distributions 65 grass species with various ecological traits (i.e., indicator values for their preferred habitat) Pakistan. To record information on ...

The genera Lomatium and Cymopterus, along with many others, form a group that has been referred to previously as the perennial endemic Apiaceae subfamily Apioideae of western North America. This group of ecologically important and widespread species has been the target of numerous systematic studies, but the evolutionary relationships among these species remain elusive. Here we show that this c...

Geraniums are sensitive to ethylene during shipping and respond by abscising their petals. Treatment of stock plants with ethylene (ethephon) in order to increase cutting yield resulted in earlier flowering in Pelargonium × hortorum ‘Kim’ and ‘Veronica’, but did not result in increased susceptibility to petal abscission following exposure to 1.0 μL·L–1 ethylene. Treatment of ‘Kim’, ‘Veronica’, ...

We are facing unprecedented rates of biodiversity loss and extinction at planetary scale (IPBES, 2019). Species’ begins with the local populations that result from habitat destruction or demographic decline, often promoted by stochastic deterministic factors (e.g. genetic drift land-use changes). However, extinctions rare events pass unnoticed for most species, which hinders our ability to adop...