Preview
Description
Fungi have an unbounded love of life and death. Converting waste and corpses into resources, they are crucial to global metabolism. Inverting our habit of consumption, fungi digest their food before they eat it. They excrete enzymes onto organic materials and then absorb the soluble, pre-digested meals.
What we see in the wild is only the tip of the fungi; they spread gregariously underground. A famed Michigan fungus — one individual fungus with identical genes throughout — has been expanding for over 1500 years. It spans 37 acres and weighs over 11 tons!
Unlike animals and plants which form embryos, fungi form propagules — dormant or reproductive environmentally-resistant spores. The propagules can be blown about for thousands of years before moisture startles them into fungi-hood. They are maestros of reproduction. Their bodies are composed of threads, and during a sexual phase, many types of fungi fuse "complementary" threads. At other stages, they just clone-out and pinch off spores.
Date Created
1997
Holding Institution
University of Montana--Missoula. Environmental Studies Program
Rights Statement
Rights Holder
© 1997 Stiftung Drittes Millennium
Item Type
Exhibit
Digital File Format
image/jpeg
Media Type
Text; Image
Digital Image Number
57_wtt_file03_40-59.jpg
Recommended Citation
Liebes, Sid; Mittelstadt, Laurie; Waugh, Barbara; and Brynes, Lois, "Panel 57: What Are Fungi?" (1997). A Walk Through Time - From Stardust To Us. 57.
https://scholarworks.umt.edu/awalkthroughtime/57