Scale-Dependent Influences of Distance and Vegetation on the Composition of Aboveground and Belowground Tropical Fungal
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ENVIRONMENTAL MICROBIOLOGY
Scale-Dependent Influences of Distance and Vegetation on the Composition of Aboveground and Belowground Tropical Fungal Communities André Boraks 1 & Gregory M. Plunkett 2 & Thomas Morris Doro 3 & Frazer Alo 3 & Chanel Sam 3 & Marika Tuiwawa 4 & Tamara Ticktin 1 & Anthony S. Amend 1 Received: 29 May 2020 / Accepted: 20 September 2020 # Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature 2020
Abstract Fungi provide essential ecosystem services and engage in a variety of symbiotic relationships with trees. In this study, we investigate the spatial relationship of trees and fungi at a community level. We characterized the spatial dynamics for above- and belowground fungi using a series of forest monitoring plots, at nested spatial scales, located in the tropical South Pacific, in Vanuatu. Fungal communities from different habitats were sampled using metagenomic analysis of the nuclear ribosomal ITS1 region. Fungal communities exhibited strong distance–decay of similarity across our entire sampling range (3–110,000 m) and also at small spatial scales (< 50 m). Unexpectedly, this pattern was inverted at an intermediate scale (3.7–26 km). At large scales (80–110 km), belowground and aboveground fungal communities responded inversely to increasing geographic distance. Aboveground fungal community turnover (beta diversity) was best explained, at all scales, by geographic distance. In contrast, belowground fungal community turnover was best explained by geographic distance at small scales and tree community composition at large scales. Fungal communities from various habitats respond differently to the influences of habitat and geographic distance. At large geographic distances (80–110 km), community turnover for aboveground fungi is better explained by spatial distance, whereas community turnover for belowground fungi is better explained by plant community turnover. Future syntheses of spatial dynamics among fungal communities must explicitly consider geographic scale to appropriately contextualize community turnover. Keywords Fungi . Tree . Community . Vanuatu . Spatial scale . Distance–decay of similarity
Introduction
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s00248-020-01608-4) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * André Boraks [email protected] 1
Department of Botany, University of Hawai‘i – Mānoa, 3190 Maile Way, Honolulu, HI 96822, USA
2
New York Botanical Garden, 2900 Southern Blvd., Bronx, NY 10458-5126, USA
3
Vanuatu National Herbarium – Vanuatu Department of Forestry, PMB 9064, Port-Vila, Vanuatu
4
South Pacific Regional Herbarium, University of the South Pacific, Private Mail Bag, Laucala Campus, Suva, Fiji Islands
Fungi and plants have coexisted for millions of years, often forming important symbiotic relationships. Fungi influence forest communities [1, 2] both through antagonism (by causing negative density-dependent growth and mortality [3]) and through mutualisms (as with
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