Assignment- Fir Project Background

Select one of the following red fir reference papers and provide brief answers to the two questions about that article. Please go to our moodle site under the Fir Project link to find the links to electronic versions of these papers (although they are also on reserve in a binder called "red fir references" in the library). For this assignment, just choose ONE paper and write a succinct short paragraph to answer each question. Your short paragraph should provide a direct answer to the question, and provide a complete explanation of your answer. If the questions have multiple parts, make sure you answer each part very specifically! Some of the methods sections are too detailed or deal with techniques you might not be familiar with; however, don't let this distract you from your focus about what type of data they are and how they are used to address the hypotheses. I am looking to see that you understand the "take-home message" of these articles.

Your answers will be evaluated on how well they provide a direct and clear answer to the question based on the specifics provided in the paper, and on their conceptual and logical clarity. Precision in thought in language is the best way to achieve this! Don't hesitate to ask me about these papers.

Please submit these via moodle by THURSDAY, Oct. 20 9pm. Please double-space.

Choose one of the following papers:

A) Mathiasen, RL, and CM Daugherty. 2008. Distribution of red fir and noble fir in Oregon based on dwarf mistletoe host specificity. Northwest Science 82(2): 108-119.

Q1) What characteristic do Mathiasen and Daugherty (2008) use to distinguish between different populations of firs, and how do they justify using this characteristic?

Q2) Describe the unusual geographic distribution of this characteristic that Mathiasen and Daugherty (2008) documented. What do they think this distribution is due to?

B) Oline, DK. 2008. Geographic variation in chloroplast haplotypes in the California red fir- noble fir species complex and the status of Shasta red fir. Canadian Journal of Forest Research 38: 2705-2710.

Q1) What do Oline's (2008) data suggest about the possibility of hybridization between red and noble fir, and why? (The fact that the rbcL and trnD genes are linked is not evidence - but are specific alleles linked?)

Q2) Cones with intermediate length bracts in both northern California/Southern Oregon and in the far southern Sierra Nevada have been described as one subspecies of red fir, the Shasta red fir (Abies magnifica shastensis). What evidence does Oline (2008) use to argue that this description of the Shasta red fir is not meaningful?

C) Parker, EL. 1963. The geographic overlap of noble fir and red fir. Forest Science 9: 207-216.

Q1) How does Parker's (1963) description of the fir in the Klamath Mtns. of California as noble fir consistent with the existing chloroplast data (as shown in Table 2 of our lab manual and Oline (2008))?

Q2) What argument does Parker (1963) use to suggest that bract length is not a good character to use in distinguishing species or subspecies of fir?

D) Isoda, K., S. Shiraishi, S. Watanabe, and K. Kitamura. 2000. Molecular evidence of natural hybridization between Abies veitchii and A. homolepis (Pinaceae) revealed by chloroplast, mitochondrial and nuclear DNA markers. Molecular Ecology 9: 1965-1974.

Q1) How does Figure 5 provide evidence that trees #145 and #215 are hybrids? For these two trees, which species was the maternal parent and which species was the paternal parent?

Q2) How did they use the data from the nuclear RAPD markers as evidence that these two trees were hybrids?

Article - Distribution of Red Fir and Noble Fir in Oregon Based on Dwarf Mistletoe Host Specificity

Robert L. Mathiasen, School of Forestry, Box 15018, Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, Arizona 86011
and

Carolyn M. Daugherty, Department of Geography, Planning, and Recreation, Box 15016, Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, Arizona 86011