A Primary Research On Seed Nucleus' Characteristcs And Nutritional Components Of The Ancient Ginkgo Trees In Suizhou And Anlu

Ginkgo biloba L., belonging to Ginkgoaceae and Ginkgo, is one of the oldest remained tree species. China is the native land of Ginkgo biloba and there is abundant ancient Ginkgo trees resource. Suizhou and Anlu of Hubei Province is one of the main concentrated distribution regions of ancient Ginkgo trees in China. In this paper, seed samples were collected from 134 ancient Ginkgo trees in Suizhou and Anlu and the seed nucleus' characteristics and nutritional components' content were analyzed. Major results were as follows:(1) Except thickness/width, significant or extreme significant differences existed in seed nucleus'characterisitcs including length, width, thickness, single pit weight, length/width and length/thickness among the ancient Ginkgo individuals, revealing a rich variation of seed nucleus' characteristics.(2) Wheter among or within the Ginkgo populations, the variation of the kernel rate was the lowest and the variation of single pit weight was the highest in all the nucleus characteristics.(3) Based on the correlation between single pit weight and other nucleus characterostics, it was suggested to select trees with heavy and wide seeds.(4) There were four types of seed nucleus in Suizhou and Anlu. Most ancient Ginkgo trees belonged to Maling type and Meihe type, a few of trees belonged to Yuanzi type and Fozhi type, none belonged to Changzi type.(5) Whether among or within the types, for the major organic nutritions, the difference of soluable sugar content was the greatest and that of starch content the smallest furthermore; while for the mineral elements, the differences of the content of N and Cu were the greatest and that of Mg content the smallest. When populations divided according to distribution area were concerned, a same situation could be seen.(6) The correlations among the content of nutritional components and between the nutrient content and seed nucleus' characteristics were very complex. In selection breeding, it was best to choose the optimum objective characters according to these correlations.(7) The variation coefficients of seed nucleus' characteristics and nutrition content in...