Presence of paratracheal water storage tissue does not alter vessel characters in cactus wood

This research tested hypotheses that the presence of water storage tissues immediately adjacent to vessels would protect vessels from cavitation and would result in evolution of broader vessels that occur in fewer, smaller clusters relative to vessels surrounded by a matrix of fibers. We examined 21 species that have dimorphic wood, that is, at one stage in their life they produce a wood with a fibrous matrix surrounding the vessels and at another stage they produce wood with abundant paratracheal parenchyma or wide‐band tracheids. In only one species were vessels in the water storage matrix broader than those in the fibrous matrix of the same plant. In most specimens, fibrous wood had smaller clusters of vessels than water storage wood, and a greater percentage of vessels in fibrous wood were solitary. Presence of abundant paratracheal water storage tissue was not correlated with a reduced number or size of rays. Axial masses in fibrous wood were not consistently narrower than those of water storage wood, consequently their vessels were not consistently closer to water stored in rays. Wood strength may be more important than conduction safety in determining vessel cluster size and widths of rays and axial masses.