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Scratching the Surface; Cryptobiotic Crust |
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Crust composition
Biological soil crusts (BSCs) are an intimate association between soil particles and cyanobacteria, algae, microfungi, lichens, and bryophytes (in different proportions) which live within or on top of the uppermost millimeters of soil. These communities have been known by a variety of names, including cryptobiotic, cryptogamic, and microbiotic soil crusts. They are found in all dryland regions of the world, including the polar regions, and in all vegetation types within these lands. In these landscapes, BSCs often cover all soil spaces not occupied by trees, grasses or shrubs and can comprise over 70% of the living ground cover...
Ecological function
The presence of these organisms on the soil surface increases soil stability. Because they are photosynthetic they also contribute carbon to the underlying soils. Free-living and lichenized cyanobacteria can also convert atmospheric nitrogen into bio-available nitrogen, and thus are an important source of this often limiting nutrient. All these organisms also secrete compounds that increase the bio-availability of phosphorus. Lichen morphological types with a more discontinuous cover (crustose, squamulose) allow water, gases, and seedlings to pass through to the soil surface, whereas mosses and lichens with a more continuous cover (foliose, fruticose) often block the flow of materials to the soil surface.
From: Rosentreter, R., M. Bowker, and J. Belnap. 2007. A Field Guide to Biological Soil Crusts of Western U.S. Drylands. U.S. Government Printing Office, Denver, Colorado. |
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| By Ben Snyder
The diversity of life on Earth is often described with reference to our "flora and fauna," but this leaves out an extremely important kingdom of organisms that are essential for all life on our planet - fungi! Though we often associate fungi and the mushrooms they produce with moisture and thus wet times of year and generally wetter ecosystems, it's important to remember that our fungal friends are an irreplaceable link within High Desert ecosystems as well - this article will lay out some basic facts about fungi and explain what some of the most common species are up to here in central Oregon.
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Are mushrooms and fungi the same thing? They are related terms, but it is helpful to be specific when we're talking about these important organisms. The fleshy structures that people commonly refer to as mushrooms are in fact just the reproductive parts of large, cryptic networks of fibrous strands. The individual strands themselves are called hyphae, the larger network of strands is called mycelium. The entirety of the mycelium, any mushrooms being produced, and any other internal structures comprise what we might think of as an individual example of a fungus. It might help to visualize fungi like an apple tree, only the branches, trunk, and the whole "tree" element is buried and just the apples emerge to be seen when they are ripe.
These "apples" are the mushrooms. Often they are quite short lived, maybe only a few hours to several days before they rot or are consumed by animals. During that short period of time they exist to spread the fungal mycelium to new suitable locations - they do this by shedding billions and billions of reproductive spores into the air, onto passers by, or even into the water. The spores are produced by specialized structures on the spore bearing surface of the mushroom, called the hymenophore. We most often think of mushrooms with gilled hymenophores, but these spore ejecting surfaces can be smooth (many polypores), toothed (hedgehog mushrooms, etc), or tubed (boletes, etc). When the spores land in a suitable location they germinate into new hyphae strands and combine with the hyphae from other spores to produce a distinctly new mycelium. Reproduction in fungi can be complicated and only sometimes mirrors the basic elements of reproduction in animals, but the above description is one of the most basic ways it can work.
Just because you don't see a mushroom in a particular spot at a particular time of year doesn't mean there are not fungi present - in fact you're almost certainly walking over dozens or hundreds of different species of fungal mycelium at any given time you're out in the wild! The fact that most mushrooms are ephemeral and the vast majority of the actual fungal organism is buried within soil, wood, or other materials can make them hard to observe, hard to study, and unfortunately harder for most people to keep in mind or fully appreciate.
Generally speaking most kinds of fungi can be classified into three separate groups based on how they take in their energy. First are the parasites - these species extract energy from other living organisms. Most often they are parasitic on plants, but some species are parasitic on other fungi or even animals. In the forests of the high desert one often finds mushrooms like Armillaria (Honey Mushrooms) growing at the base of hardwoods or conifers, a sign the mycelium is eating away at the lignin in the tree's wood. If you see these growing on a tree near you that tree is probably in trouble! Another common parasite in conifer forests of central Oregon is Phaeolus schweinitzii (Dyer's Polypore) - a beautiful stalked bracket fungus that feeds on the roots of trees like the Douglas Fir. Though their vivid concentric ridges and usefulness for creating natural dye make it a very interesting fungus, it's a bad sign for any tree surrounded by these fellows!
Second are the mycorrhizal fungi - these species live in symbiotic relationships with the roots of plants, exchanging their own nutrients for the abundant carbohydrates produced by the plants' photosynthesis. Such relationships are critical to plant survival and health in many instances, and should be of major concern to anyone wishing to grow plants at home! From garden vegetables to the largest and oldest conifers, almost all plants can benefit from either generalist or very specific mycorrhizal fungi... Continue Reading
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| Armillaria sp. (Honey mushrooms) |
Phaeolus schweinitzii (Dyer's Polypore) |
Tricholoma populinum (Cottonwood Mushroom) |
Russula rhodocephala (Redhead Russula)
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Boletus edulis (Cep, Porcini or Penny Bun Bolete)
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Neolentinus ponderosus (Giant Sawgill)
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Tulostoma
(Stalked Puffballs) |
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Mulch simpler than you think... |
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Some native species don’t respond well to any type of mulch, however a nice layer of top dressing finishes the landscape and improves aesthetic value. If you mulch, consider using a well composted material that’s not hydrophobic. Juniper duff (the piles of organic matter at the base of juniper trees) makes a perfect top dressing. It’s dark in color and has an even texture, but even more importantly, juniper duff contains many populations of beneficial bacterial and fungal communities that complete nutrient cycling in your new landscape. Pine needles, duff, or even just debris from a surrounding natural area helps naturalize a planting, and provides many biological benefits not normally associated with commercial products.
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Plant highlight: Arctostaphylos patula (Greenleaf Manzanita) |
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Greenleaf Manzanita (Arctostaphylos patula) is a beautiful broadleaf evergreen shrub with striking reddish bark. Growing up to six feet tall and wide, it is the largest species of manzanita found on the eastern slopes of the Cascades - distinctly larger than both the Pinemat Manzanita (Arctostaphylos nevadensis) and the prostrate Bearberry Manzanita (Arctostaphylos uva-ursi). It is also one of the most widespread manzanitas, common throughout open, dry conifer forests of the Western United States. It thrives in cold, harsh, and often nutrient poor environments in part because of its unique relationships with beneficial fungi. Like all members of the botanical blueberry family Ericaceae, Arctostaphylos patula forms symbiotic root connections only with a special lineage of underground mycorrhizal mushrooms called ericoid mycorrhiza - the ericoids cannot survive without the manzanita, and vice versa! This hardy shrub is slow growing and sometimes finicky in cultivation, but is beloved as an ornamental plant for its uniquely beautiful bark and value as a wildlife plant. It tends to develop its flower buds over the cold season, meaning the white and pink urn shaped flowers are ready to bloom very early in the spring.
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Term of the day: Mycorrhizae
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Technically the term mycorrhizae refers to the point of connection between fungal hyphae and plant roots. In common use, the term refers to soil fungi that form symbiotic relationships with plants. The fungi capture water and nutrients from the soil and transfer those to a plant through the roots. In exchange, the fungi get carbohydrates (sugar) from the plant. These beneficial fungi will form relationships between plants, and between plants and the surrounding soil, providing an underground network supporting the entire plant community and allowing resources to move between plants. Some studies suggest that 99% of the plants on the planet are supported through these relationships.
These fungal associations form much of the biological support group for a native plant landscape, and can be re-established with commercially available products.
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