Evaluation of the adaptive potential of plants with variegate leaf coloration

The article presents the results of a comparative analysis of the quantitative and qualitative composition of a sample of variegated herbaceous introducents (36 names) from the collection fund of the Laboratory of Ornamental Plants, Tsitsin Main Botanical Garden, Russian Academy of Sciences. The families Poaceae, Asteraceae, Lamiaceae and Saxifragaceae have the largest number of genera containing species in which forms with this leaf color are noted. The analysis of the data of long-term field experiments allowed us to assume the presence of a multidirectional influence of adaptive characteristics on the stability in the culture of different groups of introduced plants with variegate leaf coloration. For variegate cultivars, the most widely represented in the modern collection fund of the Laboratory, differences in stability in culture were revealed depending on the ratio of the differently colored parts of the leaf blade. This group of introducers has also been studied by belonging to ecological groups, donor regions and life forms. A variant of assessing the adaptive potential of variegate introducers is proposed and tested.