The Abundance of Arbuscular Mycorrhiza Infective Propagules Under Galam Stand at Shallow Peat of South Kalimantan

Abstract

Colonization of arbuscular mycorrhiza on plants has been reported to give benefit to p lants, especially at extreme sites such as degraded peatland. Galam (Mela leuca ca juputi) is an indigenous peatland species which grows on acidic condition. The number of arbuscular mycorrhiza infective propagules is important to be determined concerning the galam regeneration due to its offered benefits that support colonization. This research aims to determine the abundance of arbuscular mycorrhiza infective propagules under galam stand and to describe symbiotic forms of AMF colonization on the roots of galam. The Most Probable Number (MPN) method, wet sieving, and root staining from the modification of Vierherlig et al., 1996, and the calculation of root’s mycorrhizal colonization by grid line technique were the methods that were used in this research. The research used Complete Randomized Design (CRD) with a 5-fold factorial pattern. The results of this study indicated a significant difference between the abundance of AMF under galam stands at the depth of 0-15 cm and 15-30 cm respectively . The results of spores identification showed 4 genera of spores, namely: Glomus, Gigaspora, Scutellospora, and Acaulospora. The structure of root colonizations were hyphae, spores, vesicles, and arbuscular.