Dependence on arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi for nodulation and growth of tropical woody legume species

The leguminous species Piptadenia gonoacantha and Piptadenia paniculata do not nodulate and grow well on sterilized substrates. For this reason selection of efficient rhizobial strains for these species becomes hard to perform. Plants growing in the field are well nodulated and colonized with mycorrhizal fungi. Mycorrhizal colonization may be an explanation for the good plant responses in the field. The effect of mycorrhizal inoculation on nodulation and growth of the woody legume species P. gonoacantha and P. paniculata was studied. The experiments were carried out under greenhouse conditions, at Embrapa Agrobiologia, Rio de Janeiro. The species were inoculated with specific rhizobia and with the mycorrhizal fungi Gigaspora margarita and Glomus clarum. Both tree species were highly responsive to mycorrhizal inoculation. Only the plants inoculated with both rhizobium and mycorrhizal fungi were nodulated. Plants inoculated with both rhizobia and mycorrhizal fungi presented higher dry matter than those inoculated only with rhizobia. P. gonoacantha plants presented higher shoot phosphorus content when inoculated with mycorrhizal fungi. These results show that mycorrhizal inoculation is needed for nodulation and growth of the tree species studied. We suggest the use of mycorrhizal fungi to select rhizobial strains for legumes which have difficulty to grow in Leonard jars.

Piptadenia gonoacantha; Piptadenia paniculata; mycorrhizal dependence; nodulation; woody legumes