Morphology of racemes, fruits and seeds of Attalea moorei in the Central Huallaga, Peru

Sinti-Pinedo D.A.; Rodríguez-Cabrera E.H.; Miranda I.P.A.; Rojas-Fox J.; Mejía K.; Vásquez-Vásquez J.E.; del Castillo Á.M.R. · Revista Mexicana de Biodiversidad (2024) · DOI: 10.22201/ib.20078706e.2024.95.5295

Resumen

The species of the genus Attalea do not have sufficient studies on morphological variability in the Western Amazonía. The aim of this study was to describe and determine the morphological variability of racemes, fruits and seeds of Attalea moorei of 3 populations of seasonally dry forests of the central basin of the Huallaga River, Peru. We evaluated 20 characteristics of interest that were analyzed and compared using the ANOVA and Kruskal-Wallis tests; they were graphically visualized by the principal component analysis and the association of characteristics was estimated through Spearman’s analysis. Of the 20 characteristics, 16 showed significant differences. The PCA showed a high variation of characteristics and variability between populations, where Lamas was the most differentiated with racimes and seeds of greater dimensions, while Pucacaca and San Pedro presented fruits of greater size and weight. The most relevant correlations were between the number of fruits/weight of the racime (0.857), weight of the fruit/ length of the fruit (0.824) and seed diameter/seed length (0.358), which could have a potential for the production of biofuel and in the extraction of oils.

Instituciones: Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos; Universidad Peruana Unión