Morphological characterization of Prunus incana Pall. by multivariate analysis

Iran is one of the most important growing centers for wild and domesticated species and varieties of Prunus subgenus Cerasus plants. Due to the suitable adaptation of wild species to the environmental and edaphic conditions of this country, they can be used as rootstock for sweet and sour cherry cultivars as well as in breeding programs for rootstock improvement, and a program has been initiated for this purpose. As a first step towards exploring the genetic diversity of P. incana Pall., morphological traits were used to evaluate the variation within its population dispersed in East and West Azerbaijan and Kordestan Provinces of Iran. In this study, 32 accessions of P. incana and 3 accessions from related species (Prunus avium L., P. cerasus L., and P. mahaleb L.) were used. Seventeen quantitative and two qualitative traits (vegetative and reproductive) were analyzed, and significant differences among accessions were found for most traits. Results of simple correlation analysis showed significant positive or negative correlations among some important traits such as tree height, leaf area, and leaf blade length and width. Factor analysis showed that leaf area, leaf blade length and width, petiole length, fruit and stone weight, fruit length and diameter, stone volume, and plant height constructed the main factors. Cluster analysis clearly discriminated P. incana accessions from other Prunus species and also differentiated P. incana accessions according to their geographic growing sites. Scatter plot analysis using two main factors also strongly confirmed the cluster analysis results.