resource

There are close links here with the sap-run fauna and freshly dead bark and cambial layer, as well as lying dead and decaying wood as succession progresses. Some species specialise in the larger trunks while many favour freshly dead branches.

Such fungi include species which are endophytes and colonise the branches while they are still alive and attached to the tree. Branches in the lower crown are shaded out and die – but remain attached to the tree - and that is when decay becomes active.  The fauna is dependent on these aerial dead branches and, while they may persist if the branch fails and falls, they appear not to actively colonise fallen branches per se.

A few species are said to develop in dead branches high in the canopy.

Standing dead trunks provide vertical sunny surfaces which are favoured by certain solitary wasps for nest sites, using the exit holes of boring beetles such as the woodworm family (Anobiidae) and longhorn beetles (Cerambycidae), and other types of existing cavity. Generally these burrows relate more to the outer dead sapwood although some may penetrate deeper into the heartwood below.