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Effects of Scarification, Phytohormones, Soil Type, and Warming on the Germination and/or Seedling Performance of Three Tamaulipan Thornscrub Forest Species

The Tamaulipan thornforests of south Texas and northeast Mexico are an ecologically and economically important conservation hotspot. Thornforest restoration is limited by native tree and shrub seedling availability for planting. Seedling shortages arise from low seed availability and knowledge gaps...

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Autores principales: Luera, Paula, Wahl-Villarreal, Kimberly, Christoffersen, Bradley O., Treviño, Abeny, Soti, Pushpa, Gabler, Christopher A.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8400868/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34451534
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/plants10081489
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author Luera, Paula
Wahl-Villarreal, Kimberly
Christoffersen, Bradley O.
Treviño, Abeny
Soti, Pushpa
Gabler, Christopher A.
author_facet Luera, Paula
Wahl-Villarreal, Kimberly
Christoffersen, Bradley O.
Treviño, Abeny
Soti, Pushpa
Gabler, Christopher A.
author_sort Luera, Paula
collection PubMed
description The Tamaulipan thornforests of south Texas and northeast Mexico are an ecologically and economically important conservation hotspot. Thornforest restoration is limited by native tree and shrub seedling availability for planting. Seedling shortages arise from low seed availability and knowledge gaps regarding best practices for germinating and growing the 70+ thornforest species desired for restoration plantings. To fill key knowledge gaps, we investigated three ecologically important thornforest species with low or highly variable germination or seedling survival rates: Ebenopsis ebano, Cordia boissieri, and Zanthoxylum fagara. For each, we quantified the effects of different dosages of chemical seed treatments used to promote germination (sulfuric acid, SA; gibberellic acid, GA; indole-3-butyric acid, IBA) on germination likelihood and timing. We also quantified the effects that these chemical seed treatments, soil media mixture type, and soil warming had on seedling survival, growth, and root morphology. Ebenopsis germination peaked (>90%) with 40–60 min SA treatment. Cordia germination peaked (40%) with 100 mg/L GA treatment. Zanthoxylum germination was negligible across all treatments. Seed molding was rare but stirring during SA treatment reduced Ebenopsis molding by 4%. Ebenopsis seedling survival, height, leaf count, and root morphology were minimally affected by seed treatments, generally reduced by warming, and influenced by soil mix, which also mediated responses to warming. These results suggest improvements to existing practices that could increase Ebenopsis germination by 10–20% and potentially double Cordia germination.
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spelling pubmed-84008682021-08-29 Effects of Scarification, Phytohormones, Soil Type, and Warming on the Germination and/or Seedling Performance of Three Tamaulipan Thornscrub Forest Species Luera, Paula Wahl-Villarreal, Kimberly Christoffersen, Bradley O. Treviño, Abeny Soti, Pushpa Gabler, Christopher A. Plants (Basel) Article The Tamaulipan thornforests of south Texas and northeast Mexico are an ecologically and economically important conservation hotspot. Thornforest restoration is limited by native tree and shrub seedling availability for planting. Seedling shortages arise from low seed availability and knowledge gaps regarding best practices for germinating and growing the 70+ thornforest species desired for restoration plantings. To fill key knowledge gaps, we investigated three ecologically important thornforest species with low or highly variable germination or seedling survival rates: Ebenopsis ebano, Cordia boissieri, and Zanthoxylum fagara. For each, we quantified the effects of different dosages of chemical seed treatments used to promote germination (sulfuric acid, SA; gibberellic acid, GA; indole-3-butyric acid, IBA) on germination likelihood and timing. We also quantified the effects that these chemical seed treatments, soil media mixture type, and soil warming had on seedling survival, growth, and root morphology. Ebenopsis germination peaked (>90%) with 40–60 min SA treatment. Cordia germination peaked (40%) with 100 mg/L GA treatment. Zanthoxylum germination was negligible across all treatments. Seed molding was rare but stirring during SA treatment reduced Ebenopsis molding by 4%. Ebenopsis seedling survival, height, leaf count, and root morphology were minimally affected by seed treatments, generally reduced by warming, and influenced by soil mix, which also mediated responses to warming. These results suggest improvements to existing practices that could increase Ebenopsis germination by 10–20% and potentially double Cordia germination. MDPI 2021-07-21 /pmc/articles/PMC8400868/ /pubmed/34451534 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/plants10081489 Text en © 2021 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Luera, Paula
Wahl-Villarreal, Kimberly
Christoffersen, Bradley O.
Treviño, Abeny
Soti, Pushpa
Gabler, Christopher A.
Effects of Scarification, Phytohormones, Soil Type, and Warming on the Germination and/or Seedling Performance of Three Tamaulipan Thornscrub Forest Species
title Effects of Scarification, Phytohormones, Soil Type, and Warming on the Germination and/or Seedling Performance of Three Tamaulipan Thornscrub Forest Species
title_full Effects of Scarification, Phytohormones, Soil Type, and Warming on the Germination and/or Seedling Performance of Three Tamaulipan Thornscrub Forest Species
title_fullStr Effects of Scarification, Phytohormones, Soil Type, and Warming on the Germination and/or Seedling Performance of Three Tamaulipan Thornscrub Forest Species
title_full_unstemmed Effects of Scarification, Phytohormones, Soil Type, and Warming on the Germination and/or Seedling Performance of Three Tamaulipan Thornscrub Forest Species
title_short Effects of Scarification, Phytohormones, Soil Type, and Warming on the Germination and/or Seedling Performance of Three Tamaulipan Thornscrub Forest Species
title_sort effects of scarification, phytohormones, soil type, and warming on the germination and/or seedling performance of three tamaulipan thornscrub forest species
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8400868/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34451534
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/plants10081489
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