Biological studies of shiitake logs and associated mycoflora in the Virginia highlands

Shiitake growers in Virginia are experiencing considerable diminution of the fruiting life of oak logs, due primarily to Ascomycetous, competing, wood-rotting, contaminating "weed fungi" that either invade the logs after trees are felled or are present in tree tissues before felling. We surveyed several shiitake farms, and, although the fungal flora differed among them, the predominant colonizing fungi were identified as Graphostroma platystoma (also identified as Diatrype stygma), Eutypa spinosa and Slereum aff. complicatum. Other less frequently observed fungi were Stereum ostrea, Schizophyllum commune, Hymenochaete sp., Poria sp., Hypoxylon atropunctatum and Hypoxylon punctulatum. Site and means of invasion (colonization) of these "weed fungi" were studied by monitoring endophytic fungal populations in stressed and non-stressed oak trees in the Jefferson National Forest Montgomery County, Virginia. Twenty-six samples from Poverty Creek (non-stressed) and 23 from Brush Mountain (stressed) were studied. Fifty percent of the samples from the non-stressed were sterile, 23% yielded Paecilomyces variota., and 27% were colonized by other fungi. On the other hand, 100% of the samples from stressed trees (Brush Mountain) were colonized by fungi; 74% yielded P. variotii and 26% by other fungi. Thirty samples from a pin oak (Quercus paluslris) plot at Virginia Tech (non-stressed) were 74% sterile, 16% colonized by an unidentified yeast, and 10% colonized by other unknown fungi.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Science

Level thesis:degree_level

masters

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Plant Pathology

Department dc:contributor.department

Plant Pathology

Grantor dc:publisher

Virginia Tech

Year dc:date.issued

1991

Author dc:creator

• Guevara-Guerrero, Gonzalo

Chair dc:contributor.committeechair

• Stipes, R. Jay

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Palmer, John G.
• Smith, David William

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Language dc:language.iso

en

Dc Identifier Other

etd-08142009-040430

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/44227