Journal
CANADIAN JOURNAL OF BOTANY-REVUE CANADIENNE DE BOTANIQUE
Volume 79, Issue 10, Pages 1181-1188Publisher
NATL RESEARCH COUNCIL CANADA
DOI: 10.1139/b01-096
Keywords
inbreeding depression; deceptive pollination; orchid; Dactylorhiza praetermissa
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We quantified inbreeding depression for seed maturation and germination in a deceptively pollinated orchid (Dactylorhiza praetermissa (Druce) Soo). Deceptive species do not provide any reward to their pollinators, which thus visit few flowers per plant. Therefore, deceptive species are predicted to experience high outcrossing. In agreement with the prediction that species with high outcrossing rate should possess a heavy genetic load, we demonstrated inbreeding depression in one of the populations we studied. More surprisingly, we found some evidence of inbreeding depression at a small geographic scale. This was not expected, as deceptive orchids generally disperse their pollen and their seeds over long distances. We also demonstrated that the position of a flower within an inflorescence interacts with the type of cross. This indicates that resource availability might modify how severely deleterious mutations affect reproductive success. This could also explain why the intensity of inbreeding depression seems, in the populations we studied, to be determined more by environmental factors than by inbreeding level, as estimated from molecular markers. Inferences in terms of conservation biology are drawn from these results.
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