Abstract
The ecological importance of ectomycorrhizal (EM) fungi in tropical ecosystems is increasingly recognized, but few studies have used molecular methods to examine EM fungal communities in tropical forests. The diversity and composition of the EM community on Quercus crassifolia in a tropical montane cloud forest in southern Mexico were characterized using DNA sequencing of single root tips. Individual root tips commonly harbored multiple fungal species that resulted in mixed polymerase chain reaction (PCR) products. By cloning and performing gel extractions on mixed PCR samples, we identified two or more EM fungi on 26% of the root tips. When non-EM fungi were considered, this figure increased to 31% of root tips. A total of 44 EM taxa and nine non-EM taxa were detected on roots from 21 soil cores (104 root tips). Taxa in the families Russulaceae, Cortinariaceae, Inocybaceae, and Thelephoraceae were frequent. This is the first study to characterize the belowground EM community in a tropical montane cloud forest.
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Acknowledgments
We are grateful to Ken Oyama for his invaluable support of this research. We thank Mauricio Quesada and Kathy Stoner for use of laboratory space and equipment; Nidia Pérez-Nasser and Dolores Lugo for laboratory support; Consuelo Torres Bustos for providing housing in Huizteco; Jesús Pérez Moreno for assistance identifying several fruiting bodies; R. M. Davis for guidance and advice; and two anonymous reviewers for their improvements to the manuscript. This research was funded by a UC MEXUS Dissertation Research Grant, UC Davis Ecology Graduate Group block grant fellowships and a National Science Foundation Grant (#DEB-99-81711) to C. S. Bledsoe. Participation by M. E. Smith was made possible by the Harvard University Herbaria (HUH).
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ESM Fig. 1
Species accumulation curves based on randomly selecting one to five root tips per soil core. A total of 21 soil cores were sampled. (DOC 37 KB)
ESM Table 1
EM fruiting bodies collected from an oak-dominated tropical cloud forest in Guerrero, Mexico. (DOC 103 KB)
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Morris, M.H., Pérez-Pérez, M.A., Smith, M.E. et al. Multiple species of ectomycorrhizal fungi are frequently detected on individual oak root tips in a tropical cloud forest. Mycorrhiza 18, 375–383 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00572-008-0186-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00572-008-0186-1