Rhizosphere soil microbiome of apple (Malus) from two German orchards

This dataset contains 16S rRNA fragments obtained from amplicon sequencing (Illumina MiSeq) of rhizospheres from apple trees from two German orchards. In each orchard, two treatments were sampled: Control (apple with a grass cover proir to planting) and Tagetes (apple with a pre-culture of Tagetes patula prior to planting). Moreover, neighboring trees with good (Better) and weak (Worse) aboveground growth were sampled, resulting in four growth-treatment combinations for each site. Bacterial/archaeal community composition comparing treatments, and within treatments growth, were investigated.