The arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi colonizing the roots of pre-nursery stage of oil palm seedlings: Elaeis guineensis in Malaysia

ABSTRACT

Aims@#Arbuscular mycorrhizal is an obligate mutualistic symbiosis fungus which survives by forming endomycorrhizal on plant roots. The arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi are not host-specific, allowing them to form a mutualistic symbiosis with a wide range of host plants including oil palm. In Malaysia, the arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi are used as a growth enhancer for the oil palm Elaeis guineensis. The arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi are introduced only during transplantation to the field when the ages of the seedlings are approximately one year old. As such, this study is designed to investigate the ability of the arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi to form colonisation with pre-nursery oil palm seedlings. @*Methodology and results@#Here, the arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi were introduced at the pre-nursery stage oil palm seedlings. After inoculation, the seedlings were harvested on different days, i.e. on day-3, day-7, day-14, day-21, day-40 and day-60 to determine the colonisation of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi. We found that the arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi are able to form a mycorrhizal association with the oil palm seedling at the pre-nursery stage after 40 days of inoculation, and the arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi that formed the association are Glomus sp. and Scutellospora sp. @*Conclusion, significance and impact of study@#This study suggested that the oil palm seedling can be made into a mycorrhizal plant as early as the nursery stage before transplanting them into the plantation.