Morphology and biomass allometry data of vines in Beijing

Lacking mechanical support tissue, vines may have distinctive
allometric laws, which may differ from the predictions of theoretical
models for self-supporting plants such as metabolic
scaling theory (MST). Here, we collected 260 branches of 12 garden vine
species to analyze the allometric relationships between diameter,
length, leaf, and stem biomass and the effects
of biotic and abiotic factors on the allometric
relationships of vine branches using mixed-effect model ANOVA. Our results
showed that the scaling exponents of diameter-length of vine
branch had significant inter-species differences and
were higher than the predictions of MST. Besides, the
exponents of herbaceous vines were higher than woody
vines. However, leaf-stem biomass of vine
branches showed isometric relationships, which supported the
predictions of MST and there was no difference among species and
life forms. Both biotic and abiotic factors had weak effects on exponents
of allometric relationships, while significant effects on
constants. These results confirmed that vines invest
more in elongation growth compared to self-supporting plants, but the
partitioning of biomass follows a strict biophysical
constraint. Our findings emphasize the significance of mechanical
support tissue proportion in plant stems, which is a critical determinant
in allometric scaling relationships.