Is stemflow a vector for the transport of small metazoans from tree surfaces down to soil?

BMC Ecology

Table 1 Organism composition per liter stemflow and stemflow volume from each tree species over 8 weeks

	Number of organisms per liter stemflow over 8 weeks (n = 3, * n = 2)								Percentage	Percentage occurrence
	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	Percentage	Percentage occurrence
Nematodes
C. betulus	9–19	26	0–10	16–16	5–85	7–15*	0	8–15	10.1	94.1
F. sylvatica	11–14	5–21	2–4	17–31*	2–205	0–3*	0	1–2*	13.5	100.0
Q. robur	0	0	0	10–40	0	10	0	0	3.8	27.3
Rotifers
C. betulus	11–76	31	6–80	8–31	8–31	73–480*	0	77–400	68.6	100.0
F. sylvatica	26–49	28–350	10–30	43–50*	43–50	38–760*	0	10–12*	70.3	100.0
Q. robur	3–24	0	0	10–28	10–27	–	0	0	8.5	63.6
Tardigrades
C. betulus	0–6	0	2–40	0–2	0–55	0–1*	0	0–3	6.0	70.6
F. sylvatica	1–7	2–50	1–4	3–5*	2–150	0–1*	0	0*	10.0	88.9
Q. robur	0–4	0	0	3–8	0	0	0	0	1.1	27.3
Mites
C. betulus	1	0	0–4	0–1	10–80	0–1*	0	5–100	10.0	82.4
F. sylvatica	0	0–13	0	0*	8–15	0*	0	0–2*	1.5	100.0
Q. robur	0–9	0	10–20	5–40	0	30	0	0	9.2	90.9
Collembolans
C. betulus	0–3	0	1–20	1	20–43	0*	0	5–100	5.4	76.5
F. sylvatica	1–2	7–21	1–4	1–2*	10–40	1*	0	1–0*	4.6	72.2
Q. robur	24–340	0	110–430	33–46	0	80	0	0	77.3	100.0
Liter stemflow collected
C. betulus	2.2–15.5	0–0.4	0.1–2.5	5.2–10.0	0.1–0.4	10.0*	0.0	0.0–1.8
F. sylvatica	18.5–22.2	0.1–0.6	2.0–5.1	10.0*	0.1–1.3	10.0*	0.0	1.6–1.9*
Q. robur	0.3–0.4	0–0.1	0.1	0.2–0.7	0.0	0.0–0.1	0.0	0.0

For the collected taxa (nematodes, rotifers, tardigrades, mites, and collembolan), the abundance (range), percentage of the organism’s composition and percentage occurrence are shown for each tree species (Carpinus betulus, Fagus sylvatica, and Quercus robur) (n = 3, * n = 2)

ISSN: 1472-6785