Comparison of Three Techniques for the Study of Aquatic Hyphomycete Communities

Abstract

The aquatic hyphomycete unit-community on a single leaf, the aquatic hyphomycete community on 60 randomly collected leaves, and the aquatic hyphomycete propagule pool in the Sangamon River, Illinois, were sampled simultaneously and the resulting data compared. No single species was clearly dominant according to all three techniques and although a large number of the same species occurred in data from all three techniques, species rankings were dissimilar. Generally, the propagule pool did not accurately reflect the structure of the aquatic hyphomycete community or the extent of colonization on randomly sampled leaves. The aquatic hyphomycete community on leaves (diversity = 13) was clearly dominated, according to relative importance values, by Filosporella annelidica and Tetracladium marchalianum. Other than a lower average number of species per leaf for oak, no major differences in aquatic hyphomycete community structure occurred between oak and maple leaves.