Growth and Physiological Responses to Water Depths in Carex schmidtii Meinsh

A greenhouse experiment was performed to investigate growth and physiological responses to water depth in completely submerged condition of a wetland plant Carex schmidtii Meinsh., one of the dominant species in the Longwan Crater Lake wetlands (China). Growth and physiological responses of C. schmidtii were investigated by growing under control (non-submerged) and three submerged conditions (5 cm, 15 cm and 25 cm water level). Total biomass was highest in control, intermediate in 5 cm treatment and lowest in the other two submerged treatments. Water depth prominently affected the first-order lateral root to main root mass ratio. Alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH) activity decreased but malondialdehyde (MDA) content increased as water depth increased. The starch contents showed no differences among the various treatments at the end of the experiment. However, soluble sugar contents were highest in control, intermediate in 5 cm and 15 cm treatments and lowest in 25 cm treatment. Our data suggest that submergence depth affected some aspects of growth and physiology of C. schmidtii, which can reduce anoxia damage not only through maintaining the non-elongation strategy in shoot part but also by adjusting biomass allocation to different root orders rather than adjusting root-shoot biomass allocation.