Fig. 1: Phyllosphere bacteria in fresh alfalfa.

a Phylogenetic tree based on the 795 culturable phyllosphere bacteria by 16S rRNA gene sequences. The line colors in the inner circle represent four phyla of Bacillota (red), Bacteroidota (orange), Pseudomonadota (blue), and Actinomycetota (green). The colors of outer circles indicate the four media culturable microorganisms were cultured on, i.e., LA LB nutrient agar, TSA soybean-casein digest agar medium, MRS Man Rogosa Sharpe agar medium, GS Gauze’s Synthetic Medium No.1. The stars colors represent the six regions, i.e., CZ Cangzhou, DT Datong, HRB Harbin, TL Tongliao, SZ Shuozhou, ZZ Zhuozhou. The triangle colors represent the endophytes (EN) or epiphytes (EP) isolated from alfalfa leaves, and the bars on the outer represent the microbial abundance. The lactic acid bacteria used as inoculants for the following alfalfa silage were highlighted in red, and the other phyllosphere bacteria with a high abundance were in other colors. Composition of endophytes (b) and epiphytes (c) were shown for six sampling regions. Venn plots were shown for endophytic and epiphytic bacteria in the levels of genus (d) and species (e).