SMOKIES SCIENCE
Researchers head into woods for some post-wildfire studies
GATLINBURG, Tenn. — Karen Hughes, on her knees with her face just about touching the ground, is observing a tiny orange fungus about the size of a pinhead.
“These are unique in that they come up only after fires,” said Hughes, a University of Tennessee professor of ecology and evolutionary biology. “You don’t see them any other time. Part of the reason is that, during normal conditions, they don’t compete well with other fungi for food or space, but after a fire they have an opportunity and they will cover the ground like an orange blanket.”
Many scientists also are trying to seize an opportunity.
Hughes is one of many who have sought permission to do research in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park following the tragic fire in late November that burned more than 11,000 park acres.
“As word of the fire was spreading, we were contacted by about 75 different people. They represent more than 30 research institutions,” said Paul Super, the park’s research coordinator. “The vast majority were people who have done research in the park, some for a long time. Many were people who thought they might have had study plots that were within the area of burns. They want to go back and see how things changed.
“They were saying, ‘Our expertise is in research so, if there is anything we can do to help you better understand how things happened, how to prevent
it from happening again or how to move forward with it, we would like to do it.’”
The researchers are driven not only by their desire to learn.
“They are here because they love the park and want to provide their skills,” he said.
Super gave examples of some scientists wanting to check on how the fire affected salamanders in what he called “the salamander capital of the world.” Others wanted to
know if the fire helped or hurt bats in their frantic survival fight against white-nose syndrome. For Hughes, it was fungi. “We have worked in the Smokies for 40 years. We love the place,” she said. “We felt a strong need to do something … to help document the biodiversity of the Smokies and look at the recovery. That is how we responded. After the first shock, the ‘Oh, my gosh,’ then it was, ‘What can we do?’”
So on Saturday, Hughes, her husband and UT mycologists Ron Petersen and Brandon Matheny were in the woods around Roaring Fork Motor Nature Trail southeast of Gatlinburg looking for two particular species of fungi: that little orange pyronema and a brown mushroom called the mycena galericulata.
Hughes’ is one of the first projects to receive funding — through a National Science Foundation grant. Her team of three has been in the woods about once a week since January, even before the grant funding was approved, something Super said has been a common theme among those seeking research approval.
“They are saying, ‘Just give us approval [to study in the park], we’ll find the funding,’” he said.
Hughes’ quest is multifaceted. One aspect is to determine whether those post-fire fungi are native to the region or invasives. It might also be that the pyronema fungus is not really pyronema at all but something unique to the area.
“This is one of the most biodiverse areas in the world. It has species here that are not found anywhere else,” Hughes said.
They also are looking at the role the two fungi play in recovery from a fire.
“After fires, most of the fungi is completely destroyed. An intense fire will kill everything,” Hughes explained, adding that organic material usually present in the topsoil is gutted out. “However, there are some fungi uniquely adapted to coming back.”
Those two fungi will spend years in the ground, “not completely dormant but growing very, very slowly under normal conditions,” Hughes said. They only “fruit” or sprout above ground after a fire and often for just a week or so. But, their role is important.
“Plants aren’t good at getting nutrients out of soil,” Hughes said.
Those two fungi are saprobes. Saprobes are good at harvesting energy from leaves, twigs, logs or even animal matter and producing nutrients needed for plants to grow.
Hughes and her team are collecting samplings of the fungi as well as soil samples from burn and non-burn areas to be taken to a DNA lab at UT. That DNA testing — in addition to providing other results — should be able to tell how the fungi relate to the geography around them, perhaps whether they are invasive or native and, in the pyronema’s case, whether the fungus is really pyronema at all but maybe a new species.
Hughes said she will eventually produce a report on her findings that will be reviewed by her peers to “determine if the science is sound.”
As she looked over more intensely burnt areas around Baskins Creek Trail, Hughes said she has seen great improvement since January in regrowth, pointing to some trillium that have appeared in recent weeks. She said it will be years before the forest is completely restored.
But, the rebirth has begun and these two little fungi are part of it.