The Mycobiota of High Altitude Pear Orchards Soil in Colombia

Abstract

In Colombia, the cultivation of deciduous fruit trees such as pear is expanding for socio-economic reasons and is becoming more and more important for the local population. Since organized cultivation is slowly replacing sustenance cultivation, scientific information on the present agro-environment is needed to proceed in this change in an organic and environmentally friendly way. In particular, this study is an accurate description of the mycobiota present in the bulk soil of two different high altitude pear orchards in the Colombian Andes. The metabarcoding of soil samples allowed an in-depth analysis of the whole fungal community. The fungal assemblage was generally dominated by Ascomycota and secondly by Mortierellomycota. As observed in other studies in Colombia, the genus Mortierella was found to be especially abundant. The soil of the different pear orchards appeared to host quite different fungal communities according to the soil physico-chemical properties. The common mycobiota contained 35 fungal species, including several species of Mortierella, Humicola, Solicoccozyma and Exophiala. Moreover, most of the identified fungal species (79%) were recorded for the first time in Colombian soils, thus adding important information on soil biodiversity regarding both Colombia and pear orchards.

Soil Fungal Diversity of the Aguarongo Andean Forest (Ecuador)

“…Together with Ascomycota , the most abundant phylum in our study was Mortierellomycota . Its high abundance was expected, as this result has been recorded in other studies on the mycobiota of soil in high altitude environments [ 44 , 46 ] or from extreme environments such as the Alps [ 49 ] or Antarctica [ 50 , 51 , 52 ]. Surprisingly, in the Aguarongo forest, the abundance of Mortierellomycota is similar to that of Ascomycota .…”

“…Regarding the use of next-generation sequencing in research of soil fungal communities, there are few studies in the tropics; however, a collection of metagenomic data is being implemented [ 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 ]. Most Ecuadorian studies on soil fungi describe the diversity of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) associated with crops in the Andean part of Loja and Quito [ 47 , 48 ].…”

Fungal Indicators of Sensitivity and Resistance to Long-Term Maize Monoculture: A Culture-Independent Approach

“…The important ecological role of the presence of Mortierella in the soil environment is discussed above, whereas the role and function of Solicoccozyma in agricultural soils mainly involves biodegradation features ( Stosiek et al, 2019 ), i.e., the split of phosphorus to nitrogen and nitrogen to carbon bonds in N-phosphono-methylglycine (PMG, glyphosate). Solicoccozyma is also known for its production of indole-3-acetic acid (IAA), which is the most common phytohormone occurring in plants and regulating various aspects of plant growth and development ( Nicola et al, 2021 ). Consequently, the presence of these fungal genera in maize monoculture soils is desirable and important from the ecological point of view.…”

Soil Mycobiome Diversity under Different Tillage Practices in the South of West Siberia

“…Clonostachys genus represents globally widespread saprotrophs with the highest prevalence in soil [ 30 , 31 ]; as for Exophiala , these fungi can live saprotrophically in multiple habitats, such as bulk soil, biological crusts, rock surfaces, air, natural water masses, and rhizosphere [ 45 , 46 ], and recently were reported to increase its relative abundance in soil due to the wheat straw addition [ 47 ]. Herpotrichia have been well studied as plant (pine) pathogens [ 48 ], and the genus increased abundance under NT necessitates deeper investigation.…”