Considering that AM fungi may have both positive and negative
effects on host nutrient uptake for different nutrients, we hypothesized
that a diverse community of fungi should confer enhanced
nutrient status for hosts, compared with single isolates. Our data
do not support this hypothesis: for most nutrients, the diversity
treatments were indistinguishable from control treatments. This
contradicts the idea that ‘functioning’ in terms of host nutrient status
may result from an additive effect of species