For clonal plants, spatial spread within a site is primarily determined by production of new ramets, which suggests that allocation to this function is a key component of the population and community dynamics of clonal plant species. However, surprisingly few studies, either theoretical or empirical, quantify the amount of resources that is or should be allocated to new daughters. Instead, the focus of clonal plant research has been on two unique features of clonal growth: architecture of new ramet deployment and the degree of physiological integration among ramets. We argue that more attention should be paid to resource allocation to new ramets as an important clonal trait and present an operational definition of allocation to clonal growth on a ramet level. Specifically, we propose that clonal allocation be measured as the biomass of a new spacer from its point of origin on an old stem/node plus biomass of a new aphotosynthetic stem arising from the terminal node of the new spacer. Using this definition, we develop a set of important questions that future studies in clonal allocation should address. We then describe protocols to answer these questions and a developing international network to collect data using these protocols.

对于克隆植物，位点内的空间扩散主要取决于新分株的产生，这表明分配给该功能是克隆植物物种的种群和群落动态的关键组成部分。但是，令人惊讶的是，很少有理论或实证研究能够量化分配给或应该分配给新女儿的资源数量。相反，克隆植物研究的重点是克隆生长的两个独特特征：新的分株部署架构和分株之间的生理整合程度。我们认为应该更多地关注对新分株的资源分配，这是重要的克隆性状，并提出了在分株水平上分配给克隆生长的操作性定义。特别，我们建议将克隆分配作为一种新间隔物的生物量进行测量，该间隔物是从其在旧茎/节上的起点加上新间隔物末端节点产生的新光合作用茎的生物量。使用这个定义，我们提出了一系列重要的问题，这些问题在未来的克隆分配研究中应该解决。然后，我们描述用于回答这些问题的协议，以及正在发展的国际网络，以使用这些协议来收集数据。