Open Collections

Rianhard, Olivia

University of British Columbia

The response of ectomycorrhizal fungi (EMF) to high elevation logging is understudied. Furthermore, studies of EMF communities after logging often focus on openings without examining adjacent uncut forests. This study investigated EMF communities in and surrounding openings in interior British Columbia. Studies conducted at the same site three seasons after logging found a decline in EMF richness and diversity (i) on roots of cut trees as they died; and (ii) on roots of young seedlings planted at > 16 m into the openings as compared to seedlings planted at the forest edge. Additionally, EMF communities in the openings remained different from those in the forest 12 years after logging. I returned to this site 27 years after logging; I hypothesized that forest influence on EMF richness and community composition would not have progressed further into the openings since last studied due to persisting environmental heterogeneity between the forest and openings. I also investigated spatial patterns of the EMF community in the forest for the first time at this site. I conducted Pacific Bioscience (PacBio) sequencing on ectomycorrhizal root tips of Engelmann spruce and Subalpine fir collected from the forest and openings and found that the EMF community in the forest was still different than that in the openings. The forest community had 46.05% greater richness and an overall different composition than opening communities. While the forest was characterized by late-seral associated taxa (e.g., Russula spp.), opening communities were still characterized by ruderal taxa (e.g., Amphinema byssoides and Thelephora terrestris). I also found (i) no change from earlier studies in the extent of forest influence on EMF richness or community composition in the openings; and (ii) no threshold distance into the forest at which EMF richness or community composition changed. These findings indicate that though EMF succession in the openings has been slow, the EMF community in the surrounding uncut forest may not be strongly affected by fragmentation. Therefore, similar forests may benefit from methods of timber harvest that increase forest influence by maximizing the edge to area ratio of openings or that increase environmental homogeneity between the forest and openings.

Text

2024-01-11

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International

http://hdl.handle.net/2429/87207

Biology

University of British Columbia

UBCO

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/