Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-wg55d Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-05-01T01:11:43.114Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Fire-related changes in biomass of hypogeous sporocarps at foraging points used by a tropical mycophagous marsupial

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 December 2004

Karl VERNES
Affiliation:
School of Tropical Biology, James Cook University, Townsville, Qld, 4811, Australia. E-mail: kvernes@pobox.une.edu.au Present address: School of Environmental Sciences and Natural Resources Management, University of New England, Armidale, NSW 2351, Australia.
Christopher N. JOHNSON
Affiliation:
School of Tropical Biology, James Cook University, Townsville, Qld, 4811, Australia. E-mail: kvernes@pobox.une.edu.au
Michael A. CASTELLANO
Affiliation:
USDA Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station, 3200 Jefferson Way, Corvallis, OR 97331, USA.
Get access

Abstract

Changes in pre- and post-fire biomass of hypogeous fungal sporocarps remaining at locations where an endangered mycophagous marsupial, the northern bettong (Bettongia tropica), had foraged, were assessed in fire-prone sclerophyll forest in northeastern Australia. Low to medium intensity experimental fires were set during the late dry season in 1995 and 1996 and post-foraging biomass of sporocarps (expressed as biomass of sporocarps remaining at recent B. tropica diggings) was measured at unburnt and burnt sites at approximately six-week intervals for a period of 14 months. Post-foraging biomass was significantly higher at burnt sites immediately following fire compared with control sites, solely due to increased biomass of hypogeous species belonging to the family Mesophelliaceae. Several months after fire, post-foraging biomass was significantly higher on unburnt sites compared with very low biomass on burnt sites. Twelve months after fire, the biomass on burnt and unburnt sites was not significantly different, having returned to biomass observed pre-fire. All evidence points toward mesophellioid fungi being greatly more available to bettongs on recently burnt ground, but fire may make several other sporocarp taxa considerably less available several months following fire.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
© The British Mycological Society 2004

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)