A1 Journal article (refereed)
Wood-inhabiting fungal responses to forest naturalness vary among morpho-groups (2021)

Purhonen, J., Abrego, N., Komonen, A., Huhtinen, S., Kotiranta, H., Læssøe, T., & Halme, P. (2021). Wood-inhabiting fungal responses to forest naturalness vary among morpho-groups. Scientific Reports, 11, Article 14585. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-93900-7

JYU authors or editors

Publication details

All authors or editors: Purhonen, Jenna; Abrego, Nerea; Komonen, Atte; Huhtinen, Seppo; Kotiranta, Heikki; Læssøe, Thomas; Halme, Panu

Journal or series: Scientific Reports

eISSN: 2045-2322

Publication year: 2021

Publication date: 16/07/2021

Volume: 11

Article number: 14585

Publisher: Nature Publishing Group

Publication country: United Kingdom

Publication language: English

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-93900-7

Publication open access: Openly available

Publication channel open access: Open Access channel

Publication is parallel published (JYX): https://jyx.jyu.fi/handle/123456789/77392

Abstract

The general negative impact of forestry on wood-inhabiting fungal diversity is well recognized, yet the effect of forest naturalness is poorly disentangled among different fungal groups inhabiting dead wood of different tree species. We studied the relationship between forest naturalness, log characteristics and diversity of different fungal morpho-groups inhabiting large decaying logs of similar quality in spruce dominated boreal forests. We sampled all non-lichenized fruitbodies from birch, spruce, pine and aspen in 12 semi-natural forest sites of varying level of naturalness. The overall fungal community composition was mostly determined by host tree species. However, when assessing the relevance of the environmental variables separately for each tree species, the most important variable varied, naturalness being the most important explanatory variable for fungi inhabiting pine and aspen. More strikingly, the overall species richness increased as the forest naturalness increased, both at the site and log levels. At the site scale, the pattern was mostly driven by the discoid and pyrenoid morpho-groups inhabiting pine, whereas at the log scale, it was driven by pileate and resupinate morpho-groups inhabiting spruce. Although our study demonstrates that formerly managed protected forests serve as effective conservation areas for most wood-inhabiting fungal groups, it also shows that conservation planning and management should account for group- or host tree -specific responses.

Keywords: wood-decaying fungi; biodiversity; decayed wood; tree species; natural forests; commercial forests; protected areas

Contributing organizations

Ministry reporting: Yes

Reporting Year: 2021

JUFO rating: 1