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…but this post’s petite fruiting bodies are definitely fungal “fruit”.
I think they are examples of so-called “coral fungi”, as were many of the more weird and wonderful fungi we saw in Deep Creek National Park’s old-growth stringybark forest, on an easy, leisurely 75 minute walk.
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The pictured mushroom/toadstool/ fungal fruiting body was very big, very wet.
Unable to support its own weight, it had collapsed.
In terms of its species’ viability, the “collapse” was probably of no consequence whatsoever.
I think it would be analogous to an exhausted salmon, dying after it had made the epic journey upstream and successfully laid eggs or fertilised them: job done.
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Even collectively, yesterday’s three heroes were comprehensively dwarfed by any single one of the adjacent, large leaves.
This post’s mushroom is enormously bigger and heavier.
My unscientific guesstimate is that its mass would exceed that of all three of yesterday’s ‘shrooms by at least several thousand percent.
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Most of the world’s fungal mass are mycelia – tubular filaments/threads which “network”, forming mycelium.
Reminiscent of hair or neurons, those filaments/threads are called hyphae.
You won’t see mycelium in this series – it is an invisible presence, within the earth, timber and leaf litter.
However, it is worth remembering that fungi are like icebergs – what we see is only a small portion of their selves.
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If you are partial to mosses and fungi, the premier South Australian place is the floor of the old-growth stringybark forest in Deep Creek National Park.
The best time to go there is midwinter, in a cool, wet winter.
It is less than two hours’ easy driving away from Adelaide, but in a “proper winter” this forest “feels” like another planet.
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The pictured mushroom (i.e. fungal “fruiting body”) has a cap so shiny that parts of it act like a “funhouse mirror”, yielding what look like distorted reflections of its forest home’s canopy.
To see them, you probably need a good quality screen – bigger than a phone’s…and/or you may need to zoom in on/enlarge the mushroom’s shiniest surfaces.
In any event, you should have no difficulty “discovering” an ant who made a fatal mistake.
Comments closedHere in Perth, Western Australia, it is – notionally – Winter, still.
But, as tomorrow’s sequel to this post will illustrate, Spring was already evident on Friday 21 August, 2020.
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Southwestern Western Australia is rightly renowned for the extraordinary diversity of its flowering plants.
Its fungi are even more diverse.
Fungi species comprehensively outnumber the combined total of plant and animal species.
Macrofungi are the ones with fruiting bodies big enough to be visible to an observant, naked human eye, in the wild.
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Overnight, very
Whitely, discreetly,
Very quietly
Our toes, our noses
Take hold on the loam,
Acquire the air.
In marked contrast to most eastern Australian cities, Perth is enjoying a “proper” winter in 2018.
More than 150 mm fell here in July. As I type, heavy rain is falling, and it just might be snowing on Bluff Knoll, 400 ks southeast of here.
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