Frilly fungus
I just love fungus, don’t you? There are so many gorgeous varieties of all shapes, sizes, and colors, and they serve such an important role in the forest! Fungi are the decomposers – they take complex molecules and break them down into molecules which are more readily assimilated by creatures such as trees (and many others). Without fungi, there would be no forests!
Here we see them dutifully assisting with the decomposition of a few logs. I'd love to provide you with more detailed images, but that will have to wait. My folks gave me a shiny new camera for Christmas which should capture close-ups without defocusing... Alas, it is lost in a box!
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I am a devoted fungiphile! Cool stuff.
ReplyDeleteHave you heard of/read about/seen the mammoth fungus of the Pacific Northwest? I read a great article about them not long ago. There are legends that these things are so incredibly big, they've been mistaken for bears!
ReplyDeleteI love them, too. My Dad used to hike the cool ones home from the national forests (along with the biggest, most wonderful rocks)---and somehow, never got caught. I don't know how not, because the truck bed would be practically dragging on the way home. He is just kind of a collector of things. I'll judge his ethics another time....
ReplyDeleteI love my big David Arora mushroom book-- it has a whole section on tree fungi like that. And it's fantastic bedtime reading (photos! silly anecdotes! discussions of what's too slimy to eat!) We grew up with them, but at least I never bothered to ponder the fact that there was more than one kind of huge fungus hanging off a tree. I'm starting to pay attention to them now, though.
I love your photos, Lionness!
Many thanks Duchess... I can hardly wait for one of your visits (so selfish of me, I know). Say, how has YOUR mushroom hunting been going? Any new expeditions lately?
ReplyDeleteThe formation they have made reaminds me of that of a flock of butterflies.
ReplyDeleteHmmm... what beautiful imagery Ducklover! I think there's a poem in there somewhere... :)
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