permaculture

[Lawrence London <lfljvenaura@gmail.com>]

Blood is thicker than water for the common reed—At least that's what the
soil tells us
https://phys.org/news/2017-09-blood-thicker-common-reedat-soil.html

n a paper published in *Nature Communications*, Northeastern University
Professor Jennifer Bowen and University of Rhode Island Professor Laura
Meyerson reveal that a native type of the common reed (*Phragmites
australis*) has more in common with other native populations of the plant
growing elsewhere across the country than they have in common with invasive
types occupying the same ecosystem. The results from their study will aid
in understanding how plant invasions succeed and the conditions necessary
for their success.

The common reed, *P. australis*, stands between five and fourteen feet tall
with a purplish or tan tuft at the top. As a native species, the native
lineage <https://phys.org/tags/lineage/> of *P. australis* has inhabited
North American wetlands for thousands of years but an introduced invasive *P.
australis* lineage from Europe is taking over many North American marshes.

"I work in salt marshes and I'm interested in bacteria within salt marshes,
but I've never thought about these particular plant microbe interactions
and how microbes in the soil work to both facilitate plant success and
inhibit their growth," said Bowen. "But it turns out that the evolutionary
signatures of the different plant lineages are so strong that it results in
similar microbial communities in related plants that are found across the
country, that's incredible."

In their new paper, Bowen and Meyerson examined microbial communities in
the native, invasive, and Gulf lineages of *P. australis* to understand the
lineage-specific controls on the bacterial communities in the sediments of
these plants. Research was conducted using both field surveys and
controlled common garden experiments and results from both concurred. Both
studies found that the bacterial communities in the soil, which are
influenced by the plant's root secretions, are primarily structured by
plant lineage rather than by environmental factors as was previously
thought.


Read more at:
https://phys.org/news/2017-09-blood-thicker-common-reedat-soil.html#jCp