Prevalence and severity of Melampspora lini on Linum lewisii under early snowmelt conditions

Abstract

Plant-pathogen interactions act as a selective pressure on both parties involved. Changes in their environment can cause these relationships to shift in favor of either party. Subalpine ecosystems are experiencing increased drought, early snowmelt, and advancing phenology as a result of climate change. Snowmelt typically signals key life cycle events for subalpine plants. Linum lewisii is a perennial subalpine plant that is experiencing changes in phenology as snowmelt dates shift. Melampspora lini is a fungal parasite that relies on Linum lewisii for its entire life cycle. As the phenology of L. lewisii changes with early snowmelt, is it unclear how prevalence and severity of M. lini will change. There is the potential for negative impacts on both parties, so comparing infection to demographic metrics like size and reproductive success can help us understand how climate change will affect subalpine plants; both directly through life cycle changes, and indirectly through changing plant-pathogen dynamics. Following 430 individuals, we analysed the variation in prevalence, severity, and reinfection across treatment, and the variation in demography with infection status. Size was found to be the largest determinant of infection status, so we controlled for it as a covariate in all analyses. Broadly we found a higher prevalence of rust in control treatments, and we found that infected plants were more likely to flower. Both of these factors can shift community demographics in unexpected ways, which will likely occur more frequently as climate change progresses.

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