The escalating impacts of climate change, characterized by rising average temperatures and erratic precipitation patterns, pose a significant threat to Mediterranean-climate ecosystems and high-revenue agricultural products. Among these, the Italian white truffle (Tuber magnatum Picco) represents one of the most economically valuable yet vulnerable species, with market prices reaching €4600 kg⁻¹ in 2025. Due to the persistent challenges in large-scale domestication and its reliance on specific wild habitats, the sustainability of T. magnatum production is increasingly jeopardized by prolonged droughts. This study presents a field-based case study conducted in a natural truffière in central Italy, aimed at evaluating the effects of climatic stressors and exploring the potential role of irrigation as an adaptive management strategy. A small-scale irrigation experiment was implemented over a single growing season using a Before–After–Control–Impact framework, combined with soil moisture modelling and T. magnatum DNA amount monitoring. The results indicate that supplemental irrigation can mitigate summer soil water deficits and reduce the decline in T. magnatum DNA under drought conditions. However, given the limited spatial and temporal scale of the experiment and the limited number of ascocarps collected during the study period, these findings should be considered preliminary. Overall, this study provides initial evidence that targeted irrigation may represent a promising approach to support the resilience of natural truffières under climate variability while highlighting the need for long-term and larger-scale investigations to validate its effectiveness.

Valued above all others, the white truffle species (Tuber magnatum Picco) is highly dependent on the forest ecosystem and its underground biology. Despite its economic importance, knowledge of its biology and mycorrhizal symbioses remains limited; moreover, natural yields have sharply declined, and cultivation efforts have produced inconsistent results. This study evaluated various forest and mycorrhizal inoculation techniques to promote T. magnatum mycelium development in three Tuscan sites converted to truffle cultivation, using qPCR analysis. Alongside conventional practices like irrigation, mulching, and tillage, an experimental method with a sterile, spore-inoculated soil barrier was tested to improve host root establishment, enhance mycorrhization, and maintain long-term symbiosis for healthy truffle ecosystems. Soil analyses nine months after planting Quercus robur L. seedlings showed significant differences in Tuber magnatum mycelium abundance across sites and treatments. The MA treatment—mycorrhized seedlings combined with a sterile, inoculated substrate and separation diaphragm—produced the highest mycelial levels, underscoring the importance of initial mycorrhization and soil manipulation. These findings provide valuable insights for optimizing forest management and improving truffle cultivation by enhancing mycelial development, a key step toward increasing truffle production.

This study evaluates the ecological impact of Robinia pseudoacacia L. (black locust) invasion on native chestnut (Castanea sativa Mill.) groves on Mount Amiata (Central Italy), focusing on both plant and macrofungal community dynamics. Surveys were conducted over a three-year period (2022–2024) across 16 plots to assess shifts in taxonomic alpha diversity, species richness, and trophic guild structure. Our results demonstrate that while R. pseudoacacia stands exhibit a higher Shannon–Wiener index for plants, native chestnut groves host significantly greater species richness and higher taxonomic distinctiveness across both biological groups. A major shift in fungal functional structure was observed with chestnut-dominated plots characterized by a predominance of ectomycorrhizal species (58.3%), whereas invaded stands were heavily dominated by saprotrophic fungi (73.4%). Non-metric Multidimensional Scaling (NMDS) further confirmed a clear separation in community composition between the two forest types, indicating that R. pseudoacacia invasion leads to a homogenization of the forest biota and a potential decline in ecosystem health, as evidenced by the sharp reduction in mycorrhizal diversity. These findings highlight the importance of monitoring macrofungal communities as sensitive bioindicators of the ecological degradation caused by invasive woody species.