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ambience (Madagascar Forest)
There’s a fungus among us, and if you’re a tree or a plant, that may not be such a bad thing. I’m Jim Metzner, and this is the Pulse of the Planet.
“I work with a group of organisms called endophytes, and endophyte means within the plant. And so, these are specifically fungi that live within trees, and within the tree they can be in the needles. They can be in the bark, the stem, the roots.”
Dr. Rebecca Ganley is with the Department of Forest Resources at the University of Idaho. She said that every species of plant that we know of is a host to one or more of the fungi known as endophytes. Now fungi are classified as a different kingdom from plants or animals. They lack chlorophyll – they’re typically not green – and they reproduce by spores, not seeds.
” The interaction of endophytes with their host is quite variable, and we are only just starting to understand the variety of interactions that there are. The fungal endophytes that are present provide resistance against herbivores.”
Which means that the endopyhytes can help make the host plant unpalatable to any creature that might want to eat it.
“There are some fungi in trees, which produce metabolytes, which are toxic to some insect larvae. There’s also been proposed that the fungal endophytes in the leaves are early decomposers, so when the leaves fall, that they are present within the tissue andand can start decomposing the tissue. And there’s also been aa wide variety ofof other functions as well. In small plants, they found geothermal tolerance, so, for instance, in Yellowstone areas some of the plants have endophytes which allow them to survive in the hot soil temperatures.
We’ll hear more on fungi in future programs. Please visit our website at Pulse-Planet-dot-com. Pulse of the Planet is made possible by the National Science Foundation. I’m Jim Metzner.
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