Fungal diversity in shade-coffee plantations in Soconusco, Mexico

BACKGROUND: As forested natural habitats disappear in the world, traditional, shade-coffee plantations offer an opportunity to conserve biodiversity and ecosystem services. Traditional coffee plantations maintain a diversity of tree species that provide shade for coffee bushes and, at the same time, are important repositories for plants and animals that inhabited the original cloud forest. However, there is still little information about shade-coffee plantation’s fungal diversity despite their relevance for ecosystem functioning as decomposers, symbionts and pathogens. Specifically, it is unknown if and what mycorrhizae-forming fungi can be found on the branches and trunks of coffee bushes and trees, which hold a diversity of epiphytes. Here, we evaluate fungal communities on specific plant microsites on both coffee bushes and shade trees. We investigate the ecological roles played by this diversity, with a special focus on mycorrhizae-forming fungi that may enable the establishment and development of epiphytic plants. METHODS: We collected 48 bark samples from coffee bushes and shade trees (coffee; tree), from four plant microsites (upper and lower trunks, branches and twigs), in two shade-coffee plantations in the Soconusco region in southern Mexico, at different altitudes. We obtained ITS amplicon sequences that served to estimate alpha and beta diversity, to assign taxonomy and to infer the potential ecological role played by the detected taxa. RESULTS: The bark of shade trees and coffee bushes supported high fungal diversity (3,783 amplicon sequence variants). There were no strong associations between community species richness and collection site, plant type or microsite. However, we detected differences in beta diversity between collection sites. All trophic modes defined by FUNGuild database were represented in both plant types. However, when looking into guilds that involve mycorrhizae formation, the CLAM test suggests that coffee bushes are more likely to host taxa that may function as mycorrhizae. DISCUSSION: We detected high fungal diversity in shade-coffee plantations in Soconusco, Chiapas, possibly remnants of the original cloud forest ecosystem. Several mycorrhiza forming fungi guilds occur on the bark of coffee bushes and shade trees in this agroecosystem, with the potential of supporting epiphyte establishment and development. Thus, traditional coffee cultivation could be part of an integrated strategy for restoration and conservation of epiphytic populations. This is particularly relevant for conservation of threatened species of Orchidaceae that are highly dependent on mycorrhizae formation.