Fungus-growing termites (subfamily Macrotermitinae) have a distinct geographical distribution, found only in the old-world tropics. Where present, they are considered to be major contributors and regulators of decomposition, with consumption rates often greater than other termite groups. This study sought to understand the relative roles of termite distribution (specifically the presence or absence of fungus-growing termites) and climatic variables (mean annual temperature, mean annual precipitation and mean annual aridity) on global patterns in deadwood decay. To answer this question, we added new salient data to an existing dataset on global wood decay by Zanne et al. (2022) available at https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.19920416.v1. We filtered the data to only include sites where termites were present and thus analysed a dataset containing 102 sites across 16 countries. We found that termite-driven decay of deadwood increased with aridity but was higher in sites with fungus-growing termites than sites without fungus-growing termites. Our results also showed that the relative role of fungus-growing termites increased with aridity, as rates of wood-discovery by termites increased with aridity but only in sites where fungus-growing termites were present. Our findings indicate that the inclusion of biogeographical differences in termite distribution could potentially alter global estimates of deadwood turnover. This repository contains new datasets on termite-driven deadwood decay of Pinus radiata wood blocks and code used for all data analyses and production of figures.

1. Biological decomposition and wildfire are two predominant and alternative processes that can mineralize organic C in forest litter. Currently, the relationships between decomposition and fire are still poorly understood. 2. We provide an empirical test of the hypothesized decoupling of surface litter bed decomposability and flammability, and the underlying traits and trait spectra. 3. We employed a 41-species set of gymnosperms of very broad evolutionary and geographic spread, because of the wide range of (absent to frequent) fire regimes they are associated with. 4. We found that the interspecific pattern of mass loss proportions in a “common garden” decomposition experiment was not correlated with any of the flammability parameters and an RDA analysis also showed that the decomposability and flammability of leaf litter were decoupled across species. This decoupling originates from the former depending mostly on SSS traits and the latter on PES traits and those trait spectra being virtually uncorrelated. 5. Synthesis. Our results show that, indeed, leaf litter decomposability and flammability parameters are decoupled across species, and this decoupling can be explained by their different drivers in terms of trait spectra: chemical traits for decomposability and size-shape traits for flammability.

AbstractBiologists are increasingly using curated, public data sets to conduct phylogenetic comparative analyses. Unfortunately, there is often a mismatch between species for which there is phylogenetic data and those for which other data are available. As a result, researchers are commonly forced to either drop species from analyses entirely or else impute the missing data. A simple strategy to improve the overlap of phylogenetic and comparative data is to swap species in the tree that lack data with ‘phylogenetically equivalent’ species that have data. While this procedure is logically straightforward, it quickly becomes very challenging to do by hand. Here, we present algorithms that use topological and taxonomic information to maximize the number of swaps without altering the structure of the phylogeny. We have implemented our method in a new R package phyndr, which will allow researchers to apply our algorithm to empirical data sets. It is relatively efficient such that taxon swaps can be quickly computed, even for large trees. To facilitate the use of taxonomic knowledge, we created a separate data package taxonlookup; it contains a curated, versioned taxonomic lookup for land plants and is interoperable with phyndr. Emerging online data bases and statistical advances are making it possible for researchers to investigate evolutionary questions at unprecedented scales. However, in this effort species mismatch among data sources will increasingly be a problem; evolutionary informatics tools, such as phyndr and taxonlookup, can help alleviate this issue.

Fungal communities often form on ephemeral substrates and dispersal is critical for the persistence of fungi among the islands that form these metacommunities. Within each substrate, competition for space and resources is vital for the local persistence of fungi. The capacity to detect and respond by dispersal away from unfavorable conditions may confer higher fitness in fungi. Informed dispersal theory posits that organisms are predicted to detect information about their surroundings which may trigger a dispersal response. As such, we expect that fungi will increase allocation to dispersal in the presence of a strong competitor. In a laboratory setting, we tested how competition with other filamentous fungi affected the development of conidial pycnidiomata (asexual fruiting bodies) in Phacidium lacerum over 10 days. Phacidium lacerum was not observed to produce more asexual fruiting bodies or produce them earlier when experiencing interspecific competition with other filamentous fungi. However, we found that a trade‐off existed between growth rate and allocation to dispersal. We also observed a defensive response to specific interspecific competitors in the form of hyphal melanization of the colony which may have an impact on the growth rate and dispersal trade‐off. Our results suggest that P. lacerum have the capacity to detect and respond to competitors by changing their allocation to dispersal and growth. However, allocation to defence may come at a cost to growth and dispersal. Thus, it is likely that optimal life history allocation in fungi constrained to ephemeral resources will depend on the competitive strength of neighbors surrounding them.

Biologists are increasingly using curated, public data sets to conduct phylogenetic comparative analyses. Unfortunately, there is often a mismatch between species for which there is phylogenetic data and those for which other data are available. As a result, researchers are commonly forced to either drop species from analyses entirely or else impute the missing data. A simple strategy to improve the overlap of phylogenetic and comparative data is to swap species in the tree that lack data with ‘phylogenetically equivalent’ species that have data. While this procedure is logically straightforward, it quickly becomes very challenging to do by hand. Here, we present algorithms that use topological and taxonomic information to maximize the number of swaps without altering the structure of the phylogeny. We have implemented our method in a new R package phyndr, which will allow researchers to apply our algorithm to empirical data sets. It is relatively efficient such that taxon swaps can be quickly computed, even for large trees. To facilitate the use of taxonomic knowledge, we created a separate data package taxonlookup; it contains a curated, versioned taxonomic lookup for land plants and is interoperable with phyndr. Emerging online data bases and statistical advances are making it possible for researchers to investigate evolutionary questions at unprecedented scales. However, in this effort species mismatch among data sources will increasingly be a problem; evolutionary informatics tools, such as phyndr and taxonlookup, can help alleviate this issue.

In fire-prone ecosystems, two important alternative fates for leaves are burning in a wildfire (when alive or as litter) or they get consumed (as litter) by decomposers. The influence of leaf traits on litter decomposition rate is reasonably well understood. In contrast, less is known about the influence of leaf traits on leaf and litter flammability. The aim of this study was twofold: (a) to determine which morphological and chemical leaf traits drive flammability; and (b) to determine if different (combinations of) morphological and chemical leaf traits drive interspecific variation in decomposition and litter flammability and, in turn, help us understand the relationship between decomposability and flammability. To explore the relationships between leaf traits and flammability of individual leaves, we used 32 evergreen perennial plant species from eastern Australia in standardised experimental burns on three types of leaf material (i.e. fresh, dried and senesced). Next, we compared these trait-flammability relationships to trait-decomposability relationships as obtained from a previous decomposition experiment (focusing on senesced leaves only). Among the three parameters of leaf flammability that we measured, interspecific variation in time to ignition was mainly explained by specific leaf area and moisture content. Flame duration and smoulder duration were mostly explained by leaf dry mass and to a lesser degree by leaf chemistry, i.e. nitrogen, phosphorus and tannin concentrations. The variation in the decomposition constant across species was unrelated to our measures of flammability. Moreover, different combinations of morphological and chemical leaf properties underpinned the interspecific variation in decomposability and flammability. In contrast to litter flammability, decomposability was driven by lignin and phosphorus concentrations. The decoupling of flammability and decomposability leads to three possible scenarios for species’ influence on litter fates: (I) fast-decomposing species for which flammability is irrelevant because there will not be enough litter to support a fire; (II) species with slow-decomposing leaves and a high flammability; and (III) species with slow-decomposing leaves and a low flammability. We see potential for making use of the decoupled trait – decomposition – flammability relationships when modelling carbon and nutrient fluxes. Including information on leaf traits in models can improve the prediction of fire behaviour. Herbivory is another key fate for leaves, but this study was focused on fire and decomposition.