Fungi Appreciation Thread!

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From late 1995 to early 2005 I used to work at a mushroom farm. At first my job was to pick them, cut the bottom of the stalk off and then present them nicely according to size in boxes. There were six levels of shelves so we used trolleys with steps to reach the top levels.

Then I used to be what was called a "runner". I would take full boxes of mushrooms from the pickers, put them on trolleys and take them to despatch who would weigh them and other stuff - ready them for transportation to shops, etc. I got really fit from that job because I was always walking and lifting.

Then I worked "outside" which was also called"Dept. B". We had Filling, Spawning, Casing and Emptying days. Basically doing everything to get the trays in the rooms ready to grow mushrooms. The machinery to do this was about 50 metres long and 2 storeys high. I used to operate it when I was rostered to do so. I also used to drive forklifts to handle the trays and loaders to handle compost.

I don't like mushrooms. To me they taste like dirt. Blech.

I do like all these heterotrophs. Personally love eating mushrooms, but though I would also immensely enjoy foraging for my own as well; I wouldn't dare. All it takes is one mistaken identity.
Meanwhile, I found a rather interesting mushroom shape terminology poster:

Ophiocordyceps unilateralis

how have i not seen this thread before today haha
i don't like to eat them as i find the texture to be very unpleasant, but...

some fruiting fun guys:


coprinus comatus (shaggy ink cap).


panellus stipticus (bitter oyster).


gymnosporangium juniperi-virginianae (cedar apple rust).


cyttaria darwinii (darwin's fungus).


geastrum triplex (collared earthstar).

I was once passing through an abandoned field that had begun to grow in with juniper, and these had emerged in synchrony on every tree in the field. It was very striking, bright orange against dark green.

the animal-like behaviors of physarum polycephalum in its plasmodial phase have inspired some wildly impressive projects, too.

in this stage it has a single cell with many nuclei and processes external stimuli across its entire body rather than through a central nervous system. it sends out branches in many directions, moving towards dark, damp, and nutritious areas and away from bright, dry, and toxic areas. when a branch discovers a good place to hang out the most efficient way of sending that information back to the main body is through the thickest and shortest route and removing redundant routes, and so by doing this the organism creates a very effective information network. it also leaves behind a slimy trail, like a physical memory system, so it knows where it has already been.

artificial intelligence has a really hard time using algorithms to find the most efficient pathways between spatially arranged points (like, the traveling salesman problem) but this slimy clump of nuclei is really good at just that.

some awesome geniuses working in robotics figured that plasmodial slime mold might be able to bridge the gap between external and internal information processing to create robots with autonomous, real-time environmental interactions...something that artificial information processors cannot do (yet).
so they created a 6-welled physarium oscillator circuit that houses a blob of slime mold. it controls a 6 legged bot's locomotion via sensors which transfer environmental light into beams of light that shine into the various wells, causing the organism to retract itself from whichever wells are hit (and thus causing the robot to run away from light sources lol).

and then there is the creepy facial expression slime mold robot

^Ha! I wondered if someone would post a picture of Toad.

Mushrooms creep me out.

Mind controlling mushroom

a fathomable zombie apocalypse ?

^yikes!

Mushrooms are more closely related to humans than originally believed
https://www.scienceabc.com/nature/how-a ... lants.html


This mushroom looks like an ear

those are edible, too


as are these, cordyceps sinensis is a traditional medicine found only in the high altitude regions of northeast india.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3121254/

and this is why i think the texture is disturbing to me. i hate the texture of animal flesh and i find mushrooms have a their own strange type of fleshiness as well.

another fun fact, the mycelium part of the mushroom grows much like the root systems of plants, and the fruiting body of the mushroom is a very small part of the actual organism. but the root-like hyphae are actually not like plant roots beyond their appearance as they digest foodstuffs like an animal would (with digestive enzymes).

(am i being annoying?)