Morpho- phenological evaluation of Festuca pallescens populations in common gardens under different environments in Patagonia

NAGAHAMA NICOLÁS; ALDANA LÓPEZ; ALEJANDRO APARICIO; ADRIANA BEIDER; PAULA MARCHELLI

Córdoba

Simposio; First Plant Breeding Symposium; 2021

Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria (INTA)

Objective: North Patagonian rangelands have been affected by desertification and overgrazing, leading to their deterioration and decreasing productivity. The strategies to mitigate these negative impacts include the domestication and breeding of key native species, such as Festuca pallescens (St. Yves) Parodi. This study aimed to characterize the relative performances (GxE interactions) in growth and seed production of F. pallescenspopulations under different common garden conditions.Materials and methods: Based on previous studies, we selected ten populations of F. pallescens and installed 600 plants per trial in randomized block designs in three different environments of Patagonia, Argentina: Bariloche, Esquel and Trelew. We measured tussock diameter as a proxy of biomass production, synflorescence production, and seed-producing plants within the first three years post-germination. We analyzed the variance usinggeneralized linear mixed models, with the two main factors (site and population) and their interaction as fixed effects.Results: In Trelew, survival was only 35%, therefore we only included the data of tussock diameter in the first year where GxE interaction was significant (F= 2.19; p= 0.002). In the second and the third year, analyses were done only in Bariloche and Esquel, being all interactions significant; nevertheless, the ranking of populations between sites slightly differed. In the second year, most populations produced more synflorescences (F=17.87;p<0.001), had higher mean tussock diameter (F= 1.94, p=0.043) in Bariloche than in Esquel, but the percentage of seed-producing plants showed not significant differences (F= 3.31; p=0.068). In the third year, populations showed higher means for all the variables in Esquel (tussock diameter: F= 5.35; p< 0.001; synflorescence production: F= 14.35; p< 0.001; seed-producing plants F= 5.05; p= 0.024).Conclusion: These results suggest that our set of populations of F. pallescens is quite sensitive to the environmental conditions but consistent in terms of relative performances. Although more research is needed, these first approaches may imply that selection for superior yield is reliable using just a few testing environments.