It has been proposed that some wind-pollinated plants have the necessary conditions for an optimal sex allocation that is male biased, though there are few data that address this prediction. We determined that two prairie grass species (Andropogon gerardii and Sorghastrum nutans) had reproductive characteristics that theoretically would result in a male-biased allocation: both species were self...

Differing biomass allocation strategy could be a necessary plant-trait associated with invasive weeds in an alien environment. The present study focused on exploring differential biomass allocation pattern as an invasive plant-trait in the two pantropical invasive malvaceous weeds Sida acuta Burm f. and Sida cordifolia L. in an anthropic peri-urban vegetation in Indian dry tropics. Eighty plant...

In dioecious plants, reproductive efforts of male and female plants can be differentially affected by herbivory due to sex-specific allocation and re-modulation of resources. Here, we investigate the effects of foliar herbivory by the polyphagous species Spodoptera littoralis (Boisduval) (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae) on male and female reproductive traits of Silene latifolia (Poir.) (Caryophyllaceae...

BACKGROUND Phenotypic plasticity of fitness-related traits is vital for plant species to adapt to variable environments. Chenopodium glaucum L. and Amaranthus retroflexus L. are two common weed species globally. Understanding the plasticity in life-history traits, especially in reproductive allocation, within and among these species is important for predicting their success and for managing the...

BACKGROUND AND AIMS Reproductive costs imply trade-offs in resource distribution at the physiological level, expressed as changes in future growth and/or reproduction. In dioecious species, females generally endure higher reproductive effort, although this is not necessarily expressed through higher somatic costs, as compensatory mechanisms may foster resource uptake during reproduction. METH...

In polygynous mammals, males generally benefit more from extra allocation of maternal resources than females. However, limitations to sex-specific allocation are usually ignored. We propose the 'allocation constraint' hypothesis, whereby maternal resource allocation is more likely to follow life-history predictions in single sex litters than in mixed sex litters, due to limitations in prenatal ...

Sex allocation theory applied to hermaphrodites assumes that there is a trade off between the allocation of resources to male and female functions, within a fixed reproductive resource budget. Charnov's classic resource allocation model predicts a more female-biased sex allocation when competition among different sperm donors is low due to diminishing fitness returns for male investment. By man...

In wind-pollinated plants, male-biased sex allocation is often positively associated with plant size and height. However, effects of size (biomass or reproductive investment) and height were not separated in most previous studies. Here, using experimental populations of monoecious plants, Ambrosia altemisiifolia, we examined (1) how male and female reproductive investments (MRI and FRI) change ...

In sexually dimorphic plants, resource allocation to reproduction often differs between sex morphs. In gynodioecious species, i.e. coexisting hermaphrodite and female plants within a population, females often produce more fruits than hermaphrodites. Since fruit production is costlier than flower production, hermaphrodites and females may regulate flower and fruit production differently in respo...