Humongous Fungus (Underground and All Around)

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From tiny microbes to the largest living thing, fungi are everywhere! Without fungi, our ecosystem would not work. It provides food for plants and animals and creates a place for them to live. But beware, some types of fungi can destroy crops through fungal diseases or even change animals’ behavior. This fascinating foraging book for kids is sure to keep little ones engaged and entertained! People had ideas that maybe they were big but nobody had any idea they were that big," says Tom Volk, a biology professor at the University of Wisconsin–La Crosse. "Well it's certainly the biggest publicity that mycology is going to get—maybe ever." Soon afterward, the discovery of an even bigger fungus in southwestern Washington was announced by Terry Shaw, then in Colorado with the U.S. Forest Service (USFS), and Ken Russell, a forest pathologist at Washington State Department of Natural Resources, in 1992. Their fungus, a specimen of Armillaria ostoyae, covered about 1,500 acres (600 hectares) or 2.5 square miles (6.5 square kilometers). And in 2003 Catherine Parks of the USFS in Oregon and her colleagues published their discovery of the current behemoth 2,384-acre Armillaria ostoyae.

Humongous Fungus | DK UK

This book works as a wonderful introduction to the fungus world for children ages 7-9. It is not intended as a field guide, so note that children should not go out and forage on their own after reading this. Thanks for reading Scientific American. Create your free account or Sign in to continue. Create Account

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There’re also the “bad guys”, or rather they face the same survival battle for the fittest in nature with the most creative weapons. And of course our food, medicine, actually every corner of our world you can think of — they’re there. Sadly, they’re just as susceptible to changes in global temperature and we need to know this because they are the very foundation of life on earth. You know those mushroom rings 🍄🍄🍄 in folklore that say they’re formed by fairies dancing in a circle? They exist! (The rings at least 😆) P.S. the largest living organism mentioned in the book is in OREGON, not Oregan. Oregan is not a place. I know because I stopped reading to do a little research so I could figure out if there was a place called Oregan that I didn't know about. Very odd typo, so odd that I wasn't sure it was a typo.

Humongous Fungus | DK Learning - dkbooks

Forgotten the title or the author of a book? Our BookSleuth is specially designed for you. Visit BookSleuthHumongous Fungus of fabulous fungi will intrigue and amaze young readers, and open their eyes to the fungi thriving all around them.

Humongous Fungus - Lynne Boddy - Google Books Humongous Fungus - Lynne Boddy - Google Books

From tiny microbes to the largest living thing, fungi are everywhere! Without fungi, our ecosystem would not work. It provides food for plants and animals and creates a place for them to live. But beware, some types of fungi can destroy crops through fungal diseases or even change animals' behavior. This fascinating foraging book for kids is sure to keep little ones engaged and entertained! Matty’s books make me super happy! They are funny, super inventive, and super silly.– Chris Riddell Their beautiful mushrooms come in all colours, shapes, and sizes. Fungal stories include the greening of the Earth, when fungi helped plants first grow on land, and the mass destruction of crops through fungal disease. From the villains of the upcoming bananageddon to plastic-eating eco-warriors, there are over 1.5 million known fungus species, and a huge, unknown number of unnamed "dark" types. Some are even found inside animals – helpful fungi break down food in animal guts, but others take over their hosts' bodies. A combination of good genes and a stable environment has allowed this particularly ginormous fungus to continue its creeping existence over the past millennia. "These are very strange organisms to our anthropocentric way of thinking," says biochemist Myron Smith of Carleton University in Ottawa, Ontario. An Armillaria individual consists of a network of hyphae, he explains. "Collectively, this network is called the mycelium and is of an indefinite shape and size." Ironically, the discovery of such huge fungi specimens rekindled the debate of what constitutes an individual organism. "It's one set of genetically identical cells that are in communication with one another that have a sort of common purpose or at least can coordinate themselves to do something," Volk explains.The book is nicely organized with a Table of Contents, Glossary, and Index. I think this would be interesting for any child generally enthusiastic about nature but also works well as a specific topic study in educational contexts.

Fungus Strange but True: The Largest Organism on Earth Is a Fungus

Not quite animals and not quite plants, the mysterious kingdom of fungi is full of secrets! Let’s unearth them together with this weird and wonderful book about mushrooms. This book explores the amazing and diverse world of fungi, mushrooms, mould on land and in the water. A team of forestry scientists discovered the giant after setting out to map the population of this pathogenic fungus in eastern Oregon. The team paired fungal samples in petri dishes to see if they fused ( see photo below), a sign that they were from the same genetic individual, and used DNA fingerprinting to determine where one individual fungus ended. Scientific American is part of Springer Nature, which owns or has commercial relations with thousands of scientific publications (many of them can be found at www.springernature.com/us). Scientific American maintains a strict policy of editorial independence in reporting developments in science to our readers. Embark on a magical tour of the forest floor and discover one of the most fascinating living organisms on this planet – fungi!The vast fungus kingdom has an estimated four million species — ten times more than plants and 600 times more than mammals. This book of fabulous fungi will intrigue and amaze young readers, and open their eyes to the fungi thriving all around them.