Abstract
Invasion of globally threatened ecosystems dominated by arbuscular mycorrhizal plants, such as the alkaline prairies and serpentine barrens of eastern North America, by species of ectomycorrhizal (ECM) pine (Pinus) seriously threatens the persistence, conservation, and ongoing restoration of these rare plant communities. Using Maryland serpentine barrens and an Ohio alkaline prairie complex as model systems, we tested the hypothesis that the invasiveness of Virginia pine (Pinus virginiana L.) into such communities is regulated by the spatial pattern of ECM fungal inoculum in the soil. ECM colonization of pine seedlings can occur by (1) hyphae growing from the roots of mature ECM pines colonizing nearby seedlings (contagion model), (2) pine seedlings being infected after germinating in open areas where spores are concentrated in feces of animals that have consumed sporocarps (centers of infection model), and (3) colonization from spores that are wind-dispersed across the landscape (background model). To test these models of dispersal of ECM fungal inoculum into these barrens, we used autocorrelation and spatially explicit mapping techniques (semivariance analysis and kriging) to characterize the distribution and abundance of ECM inoculum in soil. Our results strongly suggest that ECM fungi most often disperse into open barrens by contagion, thereby facilitating rapid pine colonization in an advancing front from mature pine forests bordering the barrens. Spatial patterns consistent with the centers of infection model were present but less common. Thus, current management techniques that rely on cutting and fire to reverse pine invasion may be ineffective because they do not kill or disrupt hyphal mats attached to mature roots of neighboring pines. Management alternatives are discussed.
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Acknowledgments
We thank the Ohio Chapter of The Nature Conservancy and the Cincinnati Museum of Natural History for permission to work at the Edge of Appalachia and the Maryland Natural Heritage Program of the Maryland Department of Natural Resources for access to Soldiers Delight Natural Environment Area. Peter Whan and David Minney of the Ohio Chapter of The Nature Conservancy and Wayne Tyndall and Jennifer Cline of the Maryland Natural Heritage Program provided valuable information about the natural history and management of the study sites. We thank Kelly Decker, William and Joy Dress, and Timothy Young for field assistance and Jennifer Brinkman, Angelique Keppler, and Tonia White-Burford for lab assistance. This research was funded in part by a Janice Carson Beatley Field Research Grant and an Ohio State University Graduate Student Alumni Research Award.
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Thiet, R.K., Boerner, R.E.J. Spatial patterns of ectomycorrhizal fungal inoculum in arbuscular mycorrhizal barrens communities: implications for controlling invasion by Pinus virginiana . Mycorrhiza 17, 507–517 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00572-007-0123-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00572-007-0123-8