Identification of Constraining Experimental-Design Factors in Mycorrhizal Pot-Growth Studies

Table 1

Root colonization summary for the pot size and inoculum distribution experiment.

		Frequency (%)			Root Length Colonized (%)			Density (mm^-1)
Pot size	Inoculum	Hyphae	Vesicles	Arbuscules	Hyphae	Vesicles	Arbuscules	Vesicles	Arbuscules
Small	AM-DI	21.0 (3.1)b	7.4 (1.0)c	21.0 (3.1)b	64.5 (3.9)a	8.7 (3.1)c	56.0 (4.1)a	1.5 (0.5)b	7.0 (0.6)a
	AM-HDL	22.8 (2.6)b	14.8 (2.3)bc	20.0 (2.5)b	76.8 (3.1)a	35.0 (5.2)a	59.1 (5.9)a	3.0 (0.2)ab	4.4 (0.3)b
Large	AM-DI	40.0 (4.1)a	20.0 (2.7)b	39.0 (3.5)a	75.3 (4.5)a	14.2 (2.2)b	58.9 (4.5)a	2.2 (0.1)b	7.0 (0.7)a
	AM-HDL	43.0 (4.4)a	37 (3.8)a	34.5 (3.5)a	82.1 (5.1)a	50.1 (6.1)a	53.4 (6.0)a	4.9 (0.6)a	3.8 (0.3)b
F-values and levels of significance
	Pot size (P)	34.9^∗∗∗	49.6^∗∗∗	28.2^∗∗∗	3.3 ns	5.8^∗	0.4 ns	0.3 ns	1.85 ns
	Inoculum (In)	0.5 ns	24.3^∗∗∗	0.8 ns	4.7^∗	51.2^∗∗∗	0.1 ns	33.3^∗∗∗	25.6^∗∗∗
	PxIn	0.1 ns	4.8^∗	0.3 ns	0.4 ns	1.1  ns	0.6 ns	0.4 ns	9.4^∗∗
	Block	3.2 ns	3.6 ns	1.8 ns	0.0 ns	2.7 ns	0.1 ns	0.3 ns	0.3 ns

Means (𝑛=5) and SE (inside parentheses) are shown,
Shared letters within each column designate treatments that are not significantly different according to Bonferonni and Scheffé mean comparison tests,
“ns” nonsignificant,
^∗𝑃<.05,
^∗∗𝑃<.01,
^∗∗∗𝑃<.001.