Data from: Testing the ectomycorrhizal dominance hypothesis for ecosystem multifunctionality in a subtropical mountain forest

Mycorrhizal associations are key mutualisms that shape the structure of
forest communities and multiple ecosystem functions. However, we lack a
framework for predicting the varying dominance of distinct mycorrhizal
associations in an integrated proxy of multifunctionality across
ecosystems. Here, we used the datasets containing diversity of
mycorrhizal associations and 18 ecosystem processes related to supporting,
provisioning, and regulating services to examine how the dominance of EcM
associations affects ecosystem multifunctionality in subtropical mountain
forests in Southwest China. Meanwhile, we synthesized the prevalence of
EcM dominant effects on ecosystem functioning in forest biomes. Our
results demonstrated that elevation significantly modified the
distributions of EcM trees and fungal dominance, which in turn influenced
multiple functions simultaneously. Multifunctionality increased with
increasing proportion of EcM associations, supporting the
ectomycorrhizal-dominance hypothesis. Meanwhile, we observed that the
impacts of EcM dominance on individual ecosystem functions exhibited
different relationships among forest biomes. Our findings
highlight the importance of ectomycorrhizal dominance in regulating
multifunctionality in subtropical forests. However, this ectomycorrhizal
feedback in shaping ecosystem functions cannot necessarily be generalized
across forests. Therefore, we argue that the predictions for ecosystem
multifunctionality in response to the shifts of mycorrhizal composition
could vary across space and time.