Impacts of cover crop residue management on the arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal communities, P nutrition and grain yield of maize

Maintaining better host crops for arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) in cover crop rotational systems can be important because having active AMF propagules present in the soil can allow for rapid colonization, better crop growth and nutrient uptake. The introduction of winter cover crops has been shown to increase nutrient uptake and yield of subsequent crops (Isobe et al., 2014), and may result from increased AMF colonization in the roots. However, there is little information regarding the effects of different cover crops and AMF communities in roots and soil on the performance of subsequent crops. We evaluated the effects of the different cover crop residues on the AMF communities, P nutrition and yield of maize.