Modern forestry management may disadvantage some mykorrhiza forming fungi because; they are dependent on late successions and cannot survive the constantly recurring breaks in the continuity of their host tree. For this study the specie goliatmusseron (Tricholoma matsutake) was chosen to investigate this possibility. In Sweden T. matsutake is found in greatest amounts north of Örnsköldsvik on glacifluvial sandy soils in association with pine trees and reindeer lichens.
Seventy two forest stands where the specie previously had been found were studied; 62 in the northern part of Sweden and ten in the southern. Several indicators were studied to find out if these stands have had a continuity of living trees. It appeared that the mean age of the stands was 115 years (51-213 years) in the northern part and 148 years (105-178 years) in the southern part. The average value of the oldest trees in northern stands was 174 years (62-356 years) and 205 years (125-305 years) in the south.
For the 14 stands where the mean age and the oldest three in the stand was less than 100 years, the assessment of the history of the stand made in field was complemented with an examination of the oldest aerial photographs that exist over these areas. For 12 of these 14 stands it was possible to confirm that there has been a continuity of trees. This means that at least 70 of the 72 stands have had a continuity of trees. The variation of the age of the trees in the forests was also assessed. Twenty stands had almost no variation, 28 stands had little variation and 24 stands had much variation.
The amount of fruit bodies of T. matsutake does not appear to be dependent on the age of the forest. The occurrence of some other selected mycorrhizal fungi in these stands were studied, both species selected as indicators for valuable forests and some other more common ones. Several of the species in ...
