Seasonal and annual variation in fungal communities associated with epigeic springtails (Collembola spp.) in boreal forests

Natural forests and plantations of Pinus are ecologically and economically important worldwide, producing an array of goods and services, including the provision of non-wood forest products. Pinus species play an important role in Mediterranean and boreal forests. Although Pinus species seem to show an ecological adaptation to recurrent wildfires, a new era of mega fires is predicted, owing to climate changes associated with global warming. As a consequence, fungal communities, which are key players in forest ecosystems, could be strongly affected by these wildfires. The aim of this study was to observe the fungal community dynamics, and particularly the edible fungi, in maritime (Pinus pinaster Ait.), austrian pine (Pinus nigra J.F. Arnold), and scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) forests growing under wet Mediterranean, dry Mediterranean, and boreal climatic conditions, respectively, by comparing the mushrooms produced in severely burned Pinus forests in each area. Sporocarps were collected during the main sampling campaigns in non-burned plots, and in burned plots one year and five years after fire. A total of 182 taxa, belonging to 81 genera, were collected from the sampled plots, indicating a high level of fungal diversity in these pine forests, independent of the climatic conditions. The composition of the fungal communities was strongly affected by wildfire. Mycorrhizal taxa were impacted more severely by wildfire than the saprotrophic taxa, particularly in boreal forests—no mycorrhizal taxa were observed in the year following fire in boreal forests. Based on our observations, it seems that fungal communities of boreal P. sylvestris forests are not as adapted to high-intensity fires as the Mediterranean fungal communities of P. nigra and P. pinaster forests. This will have an impact on reducing fungal diversity and potential incomes in rural economically depressed areas that depend on income from foraged edible fungi, one of the most important non-wood forest products.

Download Full-text

Wildfire severity reduces richness and alters composition of soil fungal communities in boreal forests of western Canada

Global Change Biology ◽

10.1111/gcb.14641 ◽

2019 ◽

Cited By ~ 7

Author(s):

Nicola J. Day ◽

Kari E. Dunfield ◽

Jill F. Johnstone ◽

Michelle C. Mack ◽

Merritt R. Turetsky ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Boreal Forests ◽

Fungal Communities ◽

Western Canada

Download Full-text

Structure and resilience of fungal communities in Alaskan boreal forest soilsThis article is one of a selection of papers from The Dynamics of Change in Alaska’s Boreal Forests: Resilience and Vulnerability in Response to Climate Warming.

Canadian Journal of Forest Research ◽

10.1139/x10-081 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 40 (7) ◽

pp. 1288-1301 ◽

Cited By ~ 64

Author(s):

D. Lee Taylor ◽

Ian C. Herriott ◽

Kelsie E. Stone ◽

Jack W. McFarland ◽

Michael G. Booth ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Mycorrhizal Fungi ◽

Picea Glauca ◽

Boreal Forests ◽

Black Spruce ◽

Cellulose Degradation ◽

Niche Partitioning ◽

Environmental Parameters ◽

Fungal Species ◽

Fungal Communities ◽

Soil Horizon

This paper outlines molecular analyses of soil fungi within the Bonanza Creek Long Term Ecological Research program. We examined community structure in three studies in mixed upland, black spruce ( Picea mariana (Mill.) BSP), and white spruce ( Picea glauca (Moench) Voss) forests and examined taxa involved in cellulose degradation at one upland site. We found that soil horizon was the factor by which fungal communities were most strongly structured and that predictable turnover in upland fungal species occurred through succession. Communities from consecutive summers were not significantly different, indicating that interannual variation was small in relation to differences between forest types and soil horizons, yet the community at a seasonal study site underwent significant changes within a year. In each study, mycorrhizal fungi dominated the community. Fungi rather than bacteria appeared to dominate [13C]cellulose degradation, with strongest growth in taxa that were not dominant members of the untreated community, including members of the genus Sebacina . Overall, our results point to considerable interannual resilience juxtaposed with narrow niche partitioning and the capacity of individual taxa in these hyperdiverse communities to respond strongly to resource inputs and changes in other abiotic environmental parameters such as temperature. Our data double the cumulative total of fungal sequences in GenBank and together achieve a better picture of fungal communities here than for any other ecosystem on earth at this time.

Download Full-text

Sheltering Role of Well-Decayed Conifer Logs for Forest Floor Fungi in Long-Term Polluted Boreal Forests

Frontiers in Microbiology ◽

10.3389/fmicb.2021.729244 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 12 ◽

Author(s):

Vladimir S. Mikryukov ◽

Olesya V. Dulya ◽

Igor E. Bergman ◽

Georgiy A. Lihodeevskiy ◽

Anzhelika D. Loginova ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Boreal Forests ◽

Fungal Diversity ◽

Woody Debris ◽

Alpha Diversity ◽

Forest Litter ◽

Forest Degradation ◽

Fungal Communities ◽

Low Rank ◽

Industrial Emissions

Coarse woody debris (CWD) provides food and shelter to a large proportion of forest biota and is considered vital for biodiversity during periods of harsh weather. However, its importance in long-term stressed ecosystems remains largely unknown. In this work, we explored the contribution of CWD to fungal diversity along the gradient of boreal forest degradation caused by 77 years of heavy industrial emissions. We analyzed the diversity and composition of fungi in 270 samples of well-decayed Picea abies and Abies sibirica logs, as well as forest litter both adjacent to and distant from the logs. Compared with forest litter, the wood had higher water content and possessed substantially lower concentrations of heavy metals, which suggests its potential favorability for biota in polluted areas. The pollution-induced loss of fungal diversity in forest litter reached 34% and was stronger in the microhabitats not influenced by CWD. Meanwhile, wood fungal communities lost less than 10% of their total richness and even increased in alpha diversity. These processes led to the diversity and compositional convergence of fungal communities from different microhabitats and substrates in polluted areas. Despite this, the importance of wood and CWD-influenced microhabitats for fungal diversity maintenance was low. Apart from wood-associated fungi, the taxa whose diversity increased in the wood of polluted areas were ectomycorrhizal fungi and eurytopic soil saprotrophs (Mucoromycota, Mortierellomycota, Eurotiomycetes, and Helotiales) that easily tolerate highly toxic litter. Within the majority of pollution-sensitive soil saprotrophic groups, only terricolous Tricholomataceae benefit from CWD as microrefugia. Upon considering the ecological variability within low-rank taxa, the importance of decayed logs as safe sites can be high for certain soil-inhabiting fungal groups in polluted areas.

Download Full-text

Fire effect and its legacy modulate soil bacterial and fungal communities in Chinese boreal forests along a chronosequence

10.1101/2020.07.31.231910 ◽

2020 ◽

Author(s):

Wei-qin Su ◽

Caixian Tang ◽

Jiahui Lin ◽

Mengjie Yu ◽

Yu Luo ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Microbial Community ◽

Boreal Forests ◽

Forest Ecosystems ◽

Soil Microbes ◽

Fungal Communities ◽

Soil Factors ◽

Soil Microbial ◽

Legacy Effect ◽

C And N ◽

Soil Bacterial

AbstractWildfire has increasingly profound and pervasive consequences for forest ecosystems via directly altering soil physicochemical properties and modulating microbial community. In this study, we examined the changes in soil properties and microbial community at different periods after highly severe wildfire events (44 plots, 113 samples) in the Chinese Great Khingan Mountains. We also separated charcoals from burnt soils to establish the relationship between soil microbes and the microbes colonized on the charcoal. Wildfire significantly altered bacterial and fungal community structures across a 29-year chronosequence. The network analysis revealed that from 17 years after fire, the complexity and connectivity of bacterial and fungal communities were significantly increased. Differential abundance analysis suggested that bacterial and fungal OTUs were enriched or depleted only during 0-4 years after fire. In addition, soil factors, including soil pH, total C and N, soil water content, and dissolved C and N, are key determinants of soil bacterial and fungal communities from 17 years after fire. The fire-derived charcoals provided a new and unusual niche for microbial colonization and charcoal microbes had a significantly different community structure from the burnt soil microbes. Our data suggest that soil bacterial and fungal communities changed dramatically during the recovery from fire events in terms of the abundance and co-occurrence networks in the boreal forest ecosystems.ImportancePervious research has reported fire altered soil microbial community composition and function during short-term succession in boreal forests. However, the long-term effect of fire and fire-derived charcoals which are regarded as fire legacy effect on soil bacterial and fungal communities composition and structure have not previously been shown. Understanding how soil microbes particularly the keystone taxa and determinative soil factors, respond to fire and its legacy matter charcoal, is critical for predicting how future fire influences soil nutrient transformations and biological processes. We accessed time chronosequence to examine the effect of fire history on soil microbial abundance and co-occurrence network. These findings suggest that soil microbes can be reshaped by fire and its legacy effect of fire-derived charcoal even in the long periods after fire and provide further insights into fire and its legacy effect.

Download Full-text

Wildfire severity reduces richness and alters composition of soil fungal communities in boreal forests of western Canada

10.26686/wgtn.14330723.v1 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Nicola Day ◽

KE Dunfield ◽

JF Johnstone ◽

MC Mack ◽

MR Turetsky ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Community Structure ◽

Community Composition ◽

Fungal Community ◽

Boreal Forests ◽

Fire Severity ◽

Fungal Communities ◽

Organic Layer ◽

Fungal Community Structure ◽

Soil Organic Layer ◽

Total Fungi

© 2019 John Wiley & Sons Ltd Wildfire is the dominant disturbance in boreal forests and fire activity is increasing in these regions. Soil fungal communities are important for plant growth and nutrient cycling postfire but there is little understanding of how fires impact fungal communities across landscapes, fire severity gradients, and stand types in boreal forests. Understanding relationships between fungal community composition, particularly mycorrhizas, and understory plant composition is therefore important in predicting how future fire regimes may affect vegetation. We used an extreme wildfire event in boreal forests of Canada's Northwest Territories to test drivers of fungal communities and assess relationships with plant communities. We sampled soils from 39 plots 1 year after fire and 8 unburned plots. High-throughput sequencing (MiSeq, ITS) revealed 2,034 fungal operational taxonomic units. We found soil pH and fire severity (proportion soil organic layer combusted), and interactions between these drivers were important for fungal community structure (composition, richness, diversity, functional groups). Where fire severity was low, samples with low pH had higher total fungal, mycorrhizal, and saprotroph richness compared to where severity was high. Increased fire severity caused declines in richness of total fungi, mycorrhizas, and saprotrophs, and declines in diversity of total fungi and mycorrhizas. The importance of stand age (a surrogate for fire return interval) for fungal composition suggests we could detect long-term successional patterns even after fire. Mycorrhizal and plant community composition, richness, and diversity were weakly but significantly correlated. These weak relationships and the distribution of fungi across plots suggest that the underlying driver of fungal community structure is pH, which is modified by fire severity. This study shows the importance of edaphic factors in determining fungal community structure at large scales, but suggests these patterns are mediated by interactions between fire and forest stand composition.

Download Full-text

Vertical stratification of microbial communities in woody plants

Phytobiomes Journal ◽

10.1094/pbiomes-06-21-0038-r ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Mohammad Bahram ◽

Kati Kings ◽

Mari Pent ◽

Sergei Polme ◽

Daniyal Gohar ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Microbial Communities ◽

Community Assembly ◽

Boreal Forests ◽

Fungal Endophytes ◽

Environmental Filtering ◽

Dispersal Limitation ◽

Distribution Patterns ◽

Fungal Communities ◽

Spatial Distance ◽

Related Factors

Bacterial and fungal endophytes form diverse communities and contribute to the performance and health of their host plants. Recent evidence suggests that both host related factors and environmental conditions determine the community structure of plant endophytes. Yet, we know little about their distribution patterns, and underlying community assembly mechanisms across plant compartments. Here we analysed the structure of bacterial and fungal communities associated with tree compartments as well as their underlying soils across 12 tree individuals in boreal forests. We found that the structure of bacterial and fungal communities depends more strongly on the vertical location of tree compartments rather than the locality, species, and individuals of host trees. Microbial communities showed much stronger host specificity in aboveground than belowground compartments. While having lower compartment community variability compared to fungi, bacterial communities were markedly more distinct between below- and aboveground components but not between hosts, reflecting the greater importance of environmental filtering rather than dispersal limitation and host identity in their community assembly. Our data suggest that spatial distance from soil as a major microbiome source contributes to the formation of microbiomes in plants, and that bacterial and fungal communities may follow contrasting assembly processes.

Download Full-text

Wildfire severity reduces richness and alters composition of soil fungal communities in boreal forests of western Canada

10.26686/wgtn.14330723 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Nicola Day ◽

KE Dunfield ◽

JF Johnstone ◽

MC Mack ◽

MR Turetsky ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Community Structure ◽

Community Composition ◽

Fungal Community ◽

Boreal Forests ◽

Fire Severity ◽

Fungal Communities ◽

Organic Layer ◽

Fungal Community Structure ◽

Soil Organic Layer ◽

Total Fungi

© 2019 John Wiley & Sons Ltd Wildfire is the dominant disturbance in boreal forests and fire activity is increasing in these regions. Soil fungal communities are important for plant growth and nutrient cycling postfire but there is little understanding of how fires impact fungal communities across landscapes, fire severity gradients, and stand types in boreal forests. Understanding relationships between fungal community composition, particularly mycorrhizas, and understory plant composition is therefore important in predicting how future fire regimes may affect vegetation. We used an extreme wildfire event in boreal forests of Canada's Northwest Territories to test drivers of fungal communities and assess relationships with plant communities. We sampled soils from 39 plots 1 year after fire and 8 unburned plots. High-throughput sequencing (MiSeq, ITS) revealed 2,034 fungal operational taxonomic units. We found soil pH and fire severity (proportion soil organic layer combusted), and interactions between these drivers were important for fungal community structure (composition, richness, diversity, functional groups). Where fire severity was low, samples with low pH had higher total fungal, mycorrhizal, and saprotroph richness compared to where severity was high. Increased fire severity caused declines in richness of total fungi, mycorrhizas, and saprotrophs, and declines in diversity of total fungi and mycorrhizas. The importance of stand age (a surrogate for fire return interval) for fungal composition suggests we could detect long-term successional patterns even after fire. Mycorrhizal and plant community composition, richness, and diversity were weakly but significantly correlated. These weak relationships and the distribution of fungi across plots suggest that the underlying driver of fungal community structure is pH, which is modified by fire severity. This study shows the importance of edaphic factors in determining fungal community structure at large scales, but suggests these patterns are mediated by interactions between fire and forest stand composition.

Download Full-text

Ectomycorrhizal fungal communities in late‐successional Swedish boreal forests, and their composition following wildfire

Molecular Ecology ◽

10.1046/j.1365-294x.1999.00553.x ◽

1999 ◽

Vol 8 (2) ◽

pp. 205-215 ◽

Cited By ~ 163

Author(s):

LENA JONSSON ◽

ANDERS DAHLBERG ◽

MARIE‐CHARLOTTE NILSSON ◽

OLLE ZACKRISSON ◽

OLA KÅRÉN

Keyword(s):

Boreal Forests ◽

Fungal Communities

Download Full-text

Yeasts dominate soil fungal communities in three lowland Neotropical rainforests

10.1101/138057 ◽

2017 ◽

Author(s):

Micah Dunthorn ◽

Håvard Kauserud ◽

David Bass ◽

Jordan Mayor ◽

Frédéric Mahé

Keyword(s):

South America ◽

Central America ◽

Forest Soils ◽

Boreal Forests ◽

Fungal Diversity ◽

Tropical Rainforest ◽

Soil Samples ◽

Fungal Communities ◽

Aquatic Environments ◽

Biogeographic Pattern

ABSTRACTForest soils typically harbour a vast diversity of fungi, but are usually dominated by filamentous (hyphae-forming) taxa. Compared to temperate and boreal forests, though, we have limited knowledge about the fungal diversity in tropical rainforest soils. Here we show, by environmental metabarcoding of soil samples collected in three Neotropical rainforests, that Yeasts dominate the fungal communities in terms of the number of sequencing reads and OTUs. These unicellular forms are commonly found in aquatic environments, and their hyperdiversity may be the result of frequent inundation combined with numerous aquatic microenvironments in these rainforests. Other fungi that are frequent in aquatic environments, such as the abundant Chytridiomycotina, were also detected. While there was low similarity in OTU composition within and between the three rainforests, the fungal communities in Central America were more similar to each other than the communities in South America, reflecting a general biogeographic pattern also seen in animals, plants, and [email protected]

Download Full-text