Biodiversità in alcune specie del genere Mentha nel territorio dei monti Nebrodi (Sicilia N-W)

In Nebrodi Mountains (N-E Sicily), the genus Mentha is represented by an high number of species, in many cases typical of humid and subhumid environments. This work was addressed to investigate about the biomorphological traits of various accessions belonging to 3 Mentha species collected in the Nebrodi highlands, namely 22 accessions of Mentha spicata, 12 of Mentha suaveolens and 13 of Mentha aquatica. Plant material was picked up starting from the early spring 2007, from different sites as in altitude and in pedological and climatic traits, that were distributed over an area of 200.000 ha approx.. Later on, all collected plant individuals were transplanted in a collection field, appositely set near Galati Mamertino (ME, Sicily). After plants establishment, the major biomorphological traits (i.e. the major characters of flowers, leaves and stalks) were measured, taking into consideration 10 randomly-chosen units of the same organ for each accession and species. The obtained data were submitted to Cluster Analysis and Principal Component Analysis. The experiment allowed a first characterization of some wild Mentha species from the Nebrodi mountains, and a tentative association between the major morpho-biological plants traits and some environmental trait of the collection sites.