Quantifying the Role of Ground Beetles for the Dispersal of and Fungi in Agricultural Landscapes.

The spread by arthropods (zoochory) is an essential dispersal mechanism for many microorganisms, like plant pathogens. Carabid beetles are very abundant and mobile ground-dwelling insects. However, their role in the dispersal of economically relevant phytopathogens, like and fungi is basically unknown. We quantified the total fungal, , and load of carabid species collected in the transition zones between small water bodies and wheat fields by screening (i) their body surface for fungal propagules with a culture-dependent method and (ii) their entire bodies for fungal DNA with a qPCR approach. The analysis of entire bodies detects fungal DNA in all carabid beetles but DNA in 98% of them. We found that 74% of the carabids carried fungal propagules on the body surface, of which only half (49%) carried propagules. We identified eight and four species on the body surface;   was dominant. The fungal, and , load differed significantly between the carabid species and was positively affected by the body size and weight of the carabids. Carabid beetles reveal a remarkable potential to disseminate different fungi. Dispersal by ground-dwelling arthropods could affect the spatial-temporal patterns of plant disease and microorganisms in general.