The Variation of Growth Traits and Leaf Morphological Characters from Different Provenances of Machilu spauhoi at Seedling Stage

A provenance test was conducted in Zengcheng, Guangzhou, with 14 provenances from the main distribution areas of Machilu spauhoi. The seedling height, ground diameter, leaf area, leaf perimeter and other traits of 14 provenances of M. spauhoi were determined, and the genetic variation of seedling traits from different provenances were analyzed. The results showed that variance coefficient of 3 seedling growth traits among and within provenances were similar, respectively. The variance coefficient of 8 leaf traits ranged from 17.52% to 44.71%, and significant difference of leaf traits existed from different provenances. The heritability of the growth traits were more than 0.750, which indicated that the traits of M. spauhoi seedling were controlled by genetic factors to a certain degree. There were highly significant differences among seedling traits, which indicated that the selection of provenances for M. spauhoi had great potential. There was no significant difference in the growth traits of the seedlings between geographical and climatic variation, with the random variation mode. The growth traits were negatively correlated with leaf size, the bigger leaves and the longer petiole, the slower the growth of seedlings. The growth traits of seedling stages were selected for clustering, 14 provenances were divided into 5 types by cluster analysis. The results showed that there was a certain geographical trend in seedling growth traits of M. spauhoi, but also had certain randomness. In this experiment, 3 superior provenances (Yongchun, Xing'an, Zhaoping) were screened out according to diameter of seedling.