Does a highly intensive plant production induce changes in the fungal soil flora?
1994
Sauthoff, W. (Biologische Bundesanstalt fuer Land- und Forstwirtschaft, Berlin (Germany). Inst. fuer Mikrobiologie) | Nirenberg, H. | Metzler, B. | Gruhn, U.
The fungal soil flora is part of the soil ecosystem and an important factor of soil fertility. The present study should elucidate, whether a long-term intensive crop production with its high input of pesticides will change the species composition of the fungal soil flora. Within a joint project of the Federal Research Center for Agriculture and Forestry two plots of a field near Ahlum/Braunschweig were selected: one of low cropping intensity without application of pesticides (I0), the other with highest meaningful input of pesticides and fertilizers (I3) for maximum crop yield. From 9.6.87 till 2.10.89 the samples were taken in eight-week intervals from the upper 5 cm of the soil. The crop rotation consisted of winter wheat, winter barley, yellow mustard (catch crop), sugar beet. Three groups of fungi were treated separately: 1) Ascomycetes, Basidiomycetes, Deuteromycetes, 2) Zygomycetes, 3) Oomycetes. A total of 38,121 isolates from 276 species were counted. Between the two intensity levels the total number of isolates did not differ significantly except for several months in the Zygomycetes; their number was higher in the low intensity plot. No significant differences were found in the number of species. It can not be claimed, that single species vanished in consequence of the high production intensity. However, the abundance of 42 species differed significantly and consistantly between the two experimental varieties: 23 species occurred more often in I0, 19 species in I2, the deviation was about 30%. Suppression and enhancement were observed to an equal extent. Though the high cropping intensity tested had a moderate influence on soil fungi species composition, it can not be concluded that this deviation has a considerable impact on soil fertility
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