Intercropped silviculture systems, a key to achieving soil fungal community management in eucalyptus plantations

PLoS One. 2015 Feb 23;10(2):e0118515. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0118515. eCollection 2015.

Abstract

Fungi are ubiquitous and important contributors to soil nutrient cycling, playing a vital role in C, N and P turnover, with many fungi having direct beneficial relationships with plants. However, the factors that modulate the soil fungal community are poorly understood. We studied the degree to which the composition of tree species affected the soil fungal community structure and diversity by pyrosequencing the 28S rRNA gene in soil DNA. We were also interested in whether intercropping (mixed plantation of two plant species) could be used to select fungal species. More than 50,000 high quality sequences were analyzed from three treatments: monoculture of Eucalyptus; monoculture of Acacia mangium; and a mixed plantation with both species sampled 2 and 3 years after planting. We found that the plant type had a major effect on the soil fungal community structure, with 75% of the sequences from the Eucalyptus soil belonging to Basidiomycota and 19% to Ascomycota, and the Acacia soil having a sequence distribution of 28% and 62%, respectively. The intercropping of Acacia mangium in a Eucalyptus plantation significantly increased the number of fungal genera and the diversity indices and introduced or increased the frequency of several genera that were not found in the monoculture cultivation samples. Our results suggest that management of soil fungi is possible by manipulating the composition of the plant community, and intercropped systems can be a means to achieve that.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Eucalyptus / microbiology*
  • Fungi / classification
  • Fungi / genetics
  • Fungi / physiology*
  • RNA, Fungal / genetics
  • RNA, Ribosomal, 28S / genetics
  • Soil Microbiology*
  • Species Specificity

Substances

  • RNA, Fungal
  • RNA, Ribosomal, 28S

Grants and funding

This work received funding from the Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq), Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (FAPERJ), Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES), Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (Fapesp, no 2010/16623-9), and the DOE Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (DOE Office of Science BER DE-FC02-07ER64494). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.