Morphological diversity of plant ear among 8 wild Elymus spp.

14 morphological traits of plant ear were used to analyze the morphological diversity of plant ear among 8 Elymus species consisting of 101 populations. The results of this study showed that the phenotypic features were different among populations of different species from the same area and different populations of the same species from different regions, indicating that 14 morphological traits were different among 8 Elymus species. The E. excelsus was maximum in ear length, ear width, spikelet length, spikelet width, spikelet number, florets number per spike, awn length of the first lemma, the first glume length and the first node length of the main rachis, and the E. atratus was minimum in ear width, length of the first lemma and awn length of the first glume. The coefficient of variance of 14 ear traits was in order by the first glumedistance between boot leaf and earthe first glume lengththe first node length of the main rachisthe first glume widthawn length of the first lemmaear widthspikelet numberflorets number per spikespikelet widthear lengthspikelet lengthawn length of the first lemmathe first palea length. The totally genetic diversity index of the total populations of each species showed a decreasing trend by E.nutansE.sibiricusE.dahuricusE.tangutorumE.excelsusE.cylindricusE.breviaristatusE.atratus and the average genetic diversity index among species was E.sibiricusE.excelsusE.nutansE.dahuricusE.atratusE.breviaristatusE.cylindricusE.tangutorum. The phenotypic differentiation coefficient was in order with E.tangutorumE.cylindricusE.dahuricusE.nutansE.sibiricusE.excelsusE.breviaristatusE.atratus. This study suggested that the diversity of 8 species in Elymus developed by diversity within population and diversity among populations, and contribution of diversity within population and diversity among population was different.