[Science] Plant Plasticity as a means to adapt to climate change

[Mauna Kea Cloudforest]

Can hardiness of a palm be determined by the environment it lives in? For example, would a king palm growing in a constantly humid tropical environment in South Florida exhibit the same degree of hardiness to an abrupt cold spell with dry air and sub freezing temperatures than a king palm growing In California where it slowly gets exposed to many nights in the 30's and 40's?

A popular notion amongst growers is that Florida freeze ratings don't apply to California and vice versa. Well, it turns out that there is growing scientific evidence that plants have a degree of adaptability to climate change that does not require genetic change over multple generations. The technical term is referred to as "Plant phenotypic plasticity".

See for example

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/03/110316084909.htm

It would be interesting to better understand how this works with palms. I have observed an interesting pattern amongst more tropical palms. When they are grown in tropical conditions like Hawaii or Florida, it's easy to get a 5 gallon plant to make giant top growth even with that little amount of root mass. That same plant grown in California will be much smaller. It seems that in a California climate, a palm needs about 2-3 times the amount of roots to produce the same level of top growth.

I planted a Hawaillan grown alfredii that had about 8 feet of top growth coming out of a 7 gallon pot. On the same token, someone gave me a California seed to plant grown alfredii that was about a third of that size but sitting in a 20 gallon pot that was literally filled with large fibrous roots.

As it turns out, the plant structures seem to change as a function of climate; things like pigmentation, root length, leaf mass and efficiency of water usage are all key players. And these things will obviously also affect a plant's hardiness.

[Funkthulhu]

TL;DR: Without relying on the random alterations to DNA via the process of evolution, plants are able to alter their morphology to adapt to different climates using gene sequences already extant in the genome and pass those switched on (or off) changes to future generations.

I would be interested to see if a Florida seed would produce the California morphology and vice versa were they planted in the other climate.

[SanDimas]

Interesting.

Plant plasticity/adaptability without necessarily changing the genetic make up of a plant.

I imagine that it would eventually do so and the rate would be dependant on the genus or species itself?

Interesting link also. This one has non plant advertisers.

Its the first time Ive linked to that site. Im sure its reputable and popular site as well...

yet they have non science oriented advertisers.

Thank you Axel.

Cheers.