Genetic Variation in Growth and Cone Traits of Pinus Koraiensis Half-Sib Families in Northeast China

Abstract

Genetic parameters were evaluated for growth and cone characteristics (tree height, diameter at breast height, volume, cone number, thousand seeds weight and single cone seeds weight) on 86 half-sib families of Pinus koraiensis aged 31 years. Analyses of variance revealed significant differences (p < 0.001) in all growth and cone traits among families while no significant differences were detected among blocks and the interaction between blocks and families. The average family values for growth traits were 17.22 m, 8.67 cm and 0.43 m 3 for tree height, diameter at breast height and volume, respectively. The average cone number, thousand seeds weight and single cone seeds weight were 17.57, 748.91 g and 77.25 g, respectively. Genotypic additive variance and phenotypic variances ranged from 0.00009 to 3.820 and from 0.0005 to 23.066, while genotypic and phenotypic coefficients of variation ranged from 2.693% to 37.196% and 4.963% to 60.595%, respectively. Heritability at the individual and family level ranged from 0.152 to 0.215 and 0.611 to 0.862, respectively. Growth traits were significantly positively correlated with each other, but cone traits showed a weak correlation with growth traits. Based on 10% selection rate, nine families each were selected as elite materials in terms of high performance in volume and cone numbers, with 22.16% and 43.82% genetic gain in volume and cone number, respectively. These results provide beneficial information to select excellent families and establish orchards of P. koraiensis from improved seeds.

Estimation of Genetic Parameters and Wood Yield Selection Index in a Clonal Trial of Korean Pine (Pinus koraiensis) in Northeastern China

“…This achievement was superior to that reported on improved Scots pine in northern Finland after clear-cutting [71]. However, the engendered economic value was significantly higher than that reported on sib-families Korean pine [18], which would be due to the difference in planting age and stand density per hectare, which has been mentioned as having an effect on wood yield per hectare in seed orchards [72].…”

“…In fact, estimating economic outcome from improved materials is of great importance to know whether outlay-related investments in tree improvement will be covered [70]. The current price reported for P. koraiensis logs was approximately 145.31 USD per cubic meter in Jilin Province [18]. Considering the average volume of clones (0.418 m 3 ), and the genetic gain of 42.96% in volume for elite clones, the price of a single tree will be increased by 26.093 USD (i.e., 15% of the initial price) and the value of the stand volume per hectare will increase by 5325.10 USD with a plant spacing of 7.0 m × 7.0 m, or a density of 204.081 trees/hectare.…”

“…Multiple traits selection has been applied to select superior Korean pine materials in different phases for its breeding, including clonal, provenance, and progeny tests [17,18]. The selection of multiple traits presents some advantages over tree selection for a single particular characteristic [19], especially when the characteristics are positively correlated and display high heritability [20].…”

Phenotypic Variability and Genetic Diversity in a Pinus koraiensis Clonal Trial in Northeastern China

“…The genetic variation parameters evaluated in this work on phenotypic traits seem to be higher, especially in fruit-related traits, with repeatability values up to 90%. A previous study of [65] reported heritability values of less than 0.7 in fruit characteristics while investigating 33 years of Korean pine half-sib families. The variation in environmental conditions in the orchard would have influenced the variation, given significant growth differences from subblocks obtained in several growth characteristics.…”

Morphometrics of Pinus patula crown and its effect on cone characteristics and seed yield in Kenya

“…Seed orchards are established from known materials with the assumption of high performance for industrial, commercial forestry (Hall et al, 2020;Kaviriri et al, 2020). Seed orchards, unlike other commercial plantations, are managed differently in term of wider spacing, pollarding and roguing for robust branching to maximize on seed production (Loewe-Muñoz et al, 2019;Weng et al, 2020;농업생명과학연구, 2019).…”