Heritability of fitness–qGen2 & qGen3

Pollen vials from Landfill sire 403 used in qGen3 crossing 2015

Pollen vials from Lf sire 403 in qGen3

Description: The main goal of the qGen2 and qGen3 experiments is to quantify the evolutionary potential of two remnant prairie populations of Echinacea angustifolia by estimating the additive genetic variance of fitness. We make estimates for two mating scenarios. The first scenario is an experimental crossing design with all matings among plants from two “core” sites: SPP and LF (core x core). The second design uses sires (pollen donors) from the core and dams from sites peripheral to the core. The crosses performed (core x core, core x periphery) in this experiment will quantify additive genetic variance for fitness in each site and each experimental group. Additionally, we will test for differentiation among families; do progeny from sires differ after accounting for maternal (dam) effects?

Start year qGen2: 2013

Start year qGen3: 2015

IMG_5251

Painted bracts demarcate 2 crosses

Location: exPt 1 (dams), remnants Landfill and Staffanson (sires), remnants Landfill (core) & around Landfill (peripheral) and remnants Staffanson (core) & railroad crossing sites (peripheral) (grand-dams), exPt 8 (progeny)

Overlaps with: Heritability of fitness–qGen1

Read updates on qgen2 & qgen3 on our flog (field blog) written by members of Team Echinacea.