Abstract:In order to explore the adaptation strategies of plants to extreme environments such as drought, strong light, saline alkali and barren soil in tropical coral islands, leaf anatomical traits of 29 species grown in Wenchang, Hainan, and transplanted to tropical coral islands were measured and compared. The results showed that compared with the same species in Wenchang, Hainan, the herbaceous plants transplanted to the tropical coral island had no significant changes except for the increase of dry matter content; while the specific leaf area (SLA) of woody plants decreased significantly, the leaf thickness and dry matter content of leaves (LDMC) increased significantly, the spongy tissue was thicker and the palisade tissue was arranged more closely, but there was no significant difference in length, density and area index of stomata. Woody plants on the island adopt the resource acquisition strategy of slow investment income, put more resources into leaf construction to enhance adaptability under stress, and improve the potential of photosynthesis and water storage to resist stress through non stomatal regulation. In conclusion, the 29 plant species on tropical coral islands had stronger resource utilization ability, could adopt more conservative resource utilization strategies, better adapt to drought, strong light and other stress environments, and could be used for vegetation construction of tropical coral islands.
