Abstract: The leaf anatomy and uhrastructure of the vascular bundle sheath cells of four ecotypes of reed (Phragmites communis Trin. ) were observed with light and electron microscope. The four ecotypes were the swamp reed, dune reed, heavy salt meadow reed and the light salt meadow reed. It was shown that the intracellular content of the vascular bundle sheath cells of the swamp reed was lower than that of the dune reed; that of the heavy salt meadow reed was between that of the former two reeds and that of the light salt meadow reed and that of the light salt meadow reed was similar to the dune reed. The chloroplasts in the swamp reed were round-shaped with poorly developed grana. Starch grains were not visualized. The uhrastructure of their chloroplasts were similar to those in the typical C3 plants as wheat. By contrast, the chloroplasts in the vascular bundle cells of the dune reed were elliptical with their structure similar to that of the typical C4 plants as maize. These chloroplasts contained some poorly developed grana thykloid. The chloroplasts of the vascular bundle sheath cells in the heavy salt meadow reed were similar to those seen in the dune reed, however, those in the light salt meadow reed appeared to be beth round .and elliptical in shape. The above results suggested a great habitat variation did occur among the four ecotypes of reed in which these exists an obvious evolutional trend from C3 to C4 plants.

Key words: Phragmites communis, Ecotypes, Photosynthetic structure, Chloroplast uhrastructure, Vascular bundle sheath cell