Effect of ectomycorrhizal fungal species on population growth and food preference of a fungivorous nematode

Fungivorous nematodes can use ectomycorrhizal (ECM) fungi as food resources in forest soils, and they may establish close predator-prey relationships in forest ecosystems. However, the effect of ECM fungal species on the growth of fungivorous nematodes is poorly studied. To identify fungivorous nematode propagation and preference for ECM fungi, we investigated the in vitro population growth and food attraction of the fungivorous nematode Aphelenchoides sp. on media with four ECM fungal species: Cenococcum geophilum, Pisolithus tinctorius, Rhizopogon roseolus and Suillus granulatus. Individual nematodes were fed on hyphae of all four ECM fungal species grown on modified Melin-Norkrans agar media. Nematode numbers were significantly lower on P. tinctorius than on all other fungal species. The other three species produced similar population growth rates, with S. granulatus producing the greatest number of nematodes at 2, 3 and 4 weeks and C. geophilum and R. roseolus producing the largest number after 8 weeks. In the histogram for nematode length classes, a unimodal pattern was fitted for P. tinctorius and R. roseolus, but a bimodal pattern was fitted for C. geophilum and S. granulatus by the Silverman test. The attraction of nematodes to S. granulatus was significantly higher than that to other ECM fungi. Our findings suggest that the propagation and body size of nematodes are ECM fungal species dependent. Predator-prey relationships between fungivorous nematodes and ECM fungi may accelerate nutrient cycles in forest ecosystems.