Discussion
These findings contribute to our understanding of how the environment may modulate sex ratios in S. caninervis, either through its direct influence on sex expression or through selection on genotypes with particular sex expression phenotypes.
Methods
We reanalyzed 271 non-expressing gametophyte shoots from a previous study on S. caninervis sex expression across microhabitats using a restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) method.
Results
We recovered a genotypic sex ratio in non-expressing shoots of 18.4♀ : 1♂, which exceeds the female bias of the phenotypic ratio (5.3♀ : 1♂; P = 0.013). We also found that the distribution of male and female genotypes across microsites with different levels of sun exposure was not predicted by patterns of sex expression in these microsites.