Diversity of AM fungi in certain ornamental plants growing at different sites of Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh, India.

Abstract

Use of flowers in Indian cultural and religious purposes has a central place in people’s daily lifestyle. In India, increasing demand and supply of various types of flowers opened a vast scope for the production of flowers. In the present study, five important ornamental plants were collected from five different sites of Allahabad, Uttar Pradesh for the survey purpose to investigate arbuscular mycorrhizal status and diversity. All the ornamental plant species were found to be mycorrhizal but the magnitude of infection varied with the sites, plants species as well as stages of plant growth. A total of 38 species belonging to four different genera of AM fungi were isolated. Glomus was recorded as the most dominant genus with 22 species, followed by Acaulospora with 14 species, sporocarp of Sclerocystis sinuosa and Scutellospora with a single unidentified species. Study of Shannon Weiner diversity index, Species richness and Species evenness also carried out in all the five sites. Diversity of all the sites showed less variation indicating a stable and a diverse fungal community.