Partner turnover and changes in ectomycorrhizal fungal communities during the early life stages of European beech ( Fagu
- PDF / 1,910,669 Bytes
- 11 Pages / 595.276 x 790.866 pts Page_size
- 90 Downloads / 150 Views
ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Partner turnover and changes in ectomycorrhizal fungal communities during the early life stages of European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) Margaux Boeraeve1 · Teun Everts2 · Kris Vandekerkhove2 · Luc De Keersmaeker2 · Peter Van de Kerckhove2 · Hans Jacquemyn1 Received: 1 August 2020 / Accepted: 21 October 2020 © Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract The first life stages of a tree are subject to strong environmental stresses and competition, limiting their chances of survival. Establishing a mutualistic relationship with mycorrhizal fungi during early life stages may increase growth and survival rates of trees, but how mycorrhizal communities assemble during these stages remains unclear. Here, we studied variation in the ectomycorrhizal (EcM) fungal communities in the soil and roots of Fagus sylvatica seedlings and saplings. Fungal DNA was extracted from the soil and seedling and sapling roots collected in 156 plots across the beech-dominated Sonian forest (Belgium) and community composition was determined through metabarcoding. EcM fungal community composition significantly differed between soil, seedlings and saplings. Russula, Amanita and Inocybe were most abundant in soil, while Lactarius and Scleroderma were more abundant in seedling and sapling roots and Xerocomellus and Laccaria were most abundant in sapling roots. Our results provide evidence of partner turnover in EcM fungal community composition with increasing age in the early life stages of F. sylvatica. Keywords Community assembly · Ectomycorrhiza · Fungal succession · Metabarcoding · Fagus sylvatica
Introduction Natural regeneration of forests depends on successful germination and establishment of tree seedlings in the understorey of a forest and subsequent growth to a mature tree. The first life stages of a tree are subject to strong intra- and interspecific competition and environmental stresses resulting from limited availability of water, nutrients and light (Ponge et al. 1998; Wagner et al. 2010). Especially in mature climax forests, light levels at the understorey can be very low (Collet et al. 2002) and hence limit photosynthetic activity of seedlings that is necessary for their establishment and growth. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s00572-020-00998-0) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Margaux Boeraeve [email protected] 1
Plant Conservation and Population Biology, Biology Department, Leuven, KU, Belgium
Research Institute for Nature and Forest, Geraardsbergen, Belgium
2
Although in some tree species masting (i.e. the massive production of seeds at irregular time intervals) can generate thousands of seedlings, this does not necessarily result in successful regeneration (Watt 1923; Szwagrzyk et al. 2001) and factors other than seed abundance may have a stronger impact on seedling establishment and growth. Apart from abiotic conditions, seedling establishment can also be
Data Loading...
