Responses to flooding of poplar clones planted in the Paraná River Delta, Argentina.

LUQUEZ VIRGINIA; ACHINELLI, FABIO; CORTIZO, SILVIA; GUIAMÉT JUAN J.

Umea

Conferencia; International Conference on Adadtation of forest and forest management to climate change; 2008

The Paraná River Delta is already experiencing the consequences of climate change. Rainfall has been increasing since 1970, and extreme rain events (more than 150 mm of rainfall in two days) are now more frequent, increasing the frequency of flooding. Forestry is the main economic activity in this area, with most part of poplar (Populus spp) plantations in Argentina located there. Therefore, genotypes with increased tolerance to flooding will be needed for the area. The aims of this work were: (1) To identify clones tolerant to flooding as suitable parents for breeding programmes to increase flood resistance; (2) To select extremes of flood tolerance for physiological and molecular studies to gain a better understanding of flooding tolerance mechanisms in poplar.