Assessment of Phenology and Morphological Diversity of 3 Species of Asteraceae: Anacyclus clavatus, Chamaemelum fuscatum and Tanacetum parthenium

The present paper deals with three species of Asteraceae: Anacyclus clavatus, Chamaemelum fuscatum and Tanacetum parthenium that have a wide range of uses in medicine and in industry. The detailed morphological characterization and the phenology are discussed. These species were characterized by inter-specific variations using 18 morphological characters and the study of phenological activities like vegetatif study, flowering time, fruiting time and seed formation for two consecutive years from 2009 till 2010.

The results of phenological study show that the 3 species studied have distinct phenologies. The longest phenological cycle is observed for Tanacetum parthenium. The results of the variance analysis showed significant differences to highly significant for the majority of the traits studied. The comparison of means reveals that Anacyclus clavatus and Chamaemelum fuscatum form a single group for most of the traits measured, while Tanacetum parthenium is clearly distinct from these two species. In addition, the principal component analysis confirms the results of the variance analysis and the comparison of means. It showed that Anacyclus clavatus and Chamaemelum fuscatum are divided into two overlapping groups, the group where Tanacetum parthenium is located is quite distant.