Fig. 1: Carbohydrate and endogenous hormone levels change dramatically during Gladiolus cormel development.

A Early cormel development is classified into 5 stages. I: stolons before swelling of the tips; II: pale cormels (Φ = 0–5 mm); III: cormels that have turned yellow (Φ = 5–7 mm); IV: enlarged cormels (Φ = 7–9 mm); cormels, as planting stocks (Φ = 9–11 mm). White bars = 1 mm, and yellow bars = 1 cm; B Sections of stolons and cormels at different stages stained by PAS. Va: vascular cells; pa: parenchyma cells. Black bars = 100 μm, red bars = 50 μm. Starch (C) and sucrose (D) levels at the different cormel development stages (I–V). Endogenous ABA (E) and GA3 (F) levels at the different cormel development stages (I–V). Averages of three biological replicates ± SDs (cormels/stolons from three different plants per biological replicate) are shown. Different letters represent statistically significant differences at p < 0.05 (one-way ANOVA and Tukey HSD post hoc test)