THOUGHTS ON CLONAL INTEGRATION - FACING THE EVOLUTIONARY CONTEXT

In this essay, I have pointed out that the appropriate evolutionary context for plant clonality dictates a focus on the impact of the derived trait of potential independence of subunits on the evolutionarily primitive trait of obligate interdependence of plant subunits, i.e. the advantages of independence. This fact prescribes a major shift in approach from previous lines of investigation which have assumed that clonal plants should fall apart and sought to determine the advantages of interdependence. The delineated reorientation calls for a significant change in the investigation of the ecology of clonality in higher plants, emphasizing factors that select for physical and physiological disintegration of the genet and de-emphasizing the need to derive ecological explanations for properties a plant will possess entirely by reason of its phylogenetic and developmental heritage. I suggest that (1) patterns of ramet independence may result from selective pressures on the cost of interconnections (2) programmed ramet independendence may be a response to the selective pressure of a high possibility of traumatic breakage and (3) programmed ramet independence may allow escape of the genet from mortality due to pathogen infestation.