“…This would, however, contrast results of an earlier study on the same species in which a strong relation between DNA methylation and phenotypic variation was revealed (Vergeer et al., ). Moreover, it is widely accepted that epigenetic variation may significantly affect phenotypic variation (Bossdorf et al., ; Cortijo et al., ; Cubas et al., ; Johannes et al., ; Zhang, Fischer, Colot, & Bossdorf, ), although how exactly gene expression and phenotype are influenced by DNA methylation, it is not entirely understood and often no obvious connection between phenotype, gene expression and DNA methylation is observed (Robertson & Richards, ; Schrey et al., ). In this study, AFLP and MS‐AFLP methods were used to analyze genetic and epigenetic variation.…”