Special Interest Group Meeting

Grazing on hyphae: fruit body and larval structures in fungus-beetle interactions

Dmitry S. Schigel, Metapopulation Research Group, University of Helsinki, Finland

Basidiomycetes vary in characteristics of hyphae, amount of organics and water involved in formation of fruit bodies, which result in different shapes and consistencies of their hyphal layers. Fruit bodies form compact and concentrated habitats and food sources for the diverse insect larvae.

The extended postmortal persistence of perennial and annual hibernating fungal fruit bodies on the wood resulted in a species-rich fauna of mycosaprotroph Coleoptera. The majority of such resident fungivorous beetles spend most of their life cycle within the fruit bodies, abandoning them for the short periods of reproduction and dispersal only. Beetles are equipped with mouthparts adapted for consumption of the particular type of hyphae or spores. Specialized morphology of fungivorous larvae of Palaearctic Erotylidae was studied with SEM. Topography of beetle larvae in relation to fruit body properties is an important variable explaining beetle species co-existence in a shared resource. Perennial species demonstrated particularly complex fruit bodies accommodating spatially structured communities of fungivorous beetles of different families. Hyphal characteristics of fungal fruit bodies influence their palatability to beetles.

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