Forest conversion from Norway spruce to European beech increases species richness and functional structure of aboveground macrofungal communities
| Autor: | Peggy Heine, Jonas Hausen, Andreas Schäffer, Martina Roß-Nickoll, Richard Ottermanns |
|---|---|
| Rok vydání: | 2019 |
| Předmět: |
0106 biological sciences
biology Forest management Forestry Picea abies Windthrow Management Monitoring Policy and Law biology.organism_classification 010603 evolutionary biology 01 natural sciences Fagus sylvatica Forest ecology Species richness Beech Salvage logging 010606 plant biology & botany Nature and Landscape Conservation |
| Zdroj: | Forest Ecology and Management. 432:522-533 |
| ISSN: | 0378-1127 |
| Popis: | This study investigated the response patterns of aboveground macrofungal communities to different management stages representing a forest conversion from Norway spruce (Picea abies) to European beech (Fagus sylvatica) in the Eifel National Park, Germany. We used a space-for-time substitution approach with three replicate study sites for each forest conversion stage: (I) even-aged single species Norway spruce, (II) unmanaged Norway spruce windthrow, (III) salvage-logged Norway spruce windthrow, (IV) single Norway spruce tree selection cutting (close-to-nature managed) with European beech underplanting and (V) old-growth, uneven-aged European beech (as reference). We assessed environmental variables and macrofungal sporocarps, while the latter were categorized into functional groups to link taxonomic information to potential ecosystem functions. Overall, we observed 235 macrofungal species. The highest species richness was found in the European beech reference stage, followed by the close-to-nature managed spruce/beech stage, while the Norway spruce stage showed approximately half the species richness, similar to the species level of both windthrow stages. Non-metric multidimensional scaling (NMDS) ordination separated each forest conversion stage into distinct fungal communities, while both windthrow stages could not be distinguished from each other. Beside tree species composition change and forest management, nutrient availability and microclimate were the main drivers of fungal community changes among the five differently-managed stages. Further, different functional groups responded in different patterns to forest management and to explanatory environmental variables. We reinforced the assumption, that old-growth, uneven-aged European beech forests (>120 years) can act as a refugium for unique forest type specific fungal communities with a higher functional structure, especially contrary to non-native, even-aged Norway spruce forests (∼70 years). Single Norway spruce tree selection cutting with further introduction of European beech trees can be an adequate strategy to allow a spruce forest conversion without necessarily reducing the macrofungal species richness and its functional structure. We displayed that ecological consequences of windthrow events can be a depression of fungal species richness and a collapse for the functional structure of fungi, especially after salvage logging. Our study underlines the need of including fungal conservation in forest conversion plans to optimize forest ecosystem integrity and resilience against biotic and abiotic agents, such as windstorm events. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
| Externí odkaz: |
|
Full Text from ScienceDirect