MUSHROOMS MAKE THEIR OWN WEATHER

Fungi alter nearby air humidity to create 'winds' that spread their spores far and wide.

• Researchers found that oyster and Shitake mushrooms release water vapour that cools the air around them, creating convection currents
• This in turn generates miniature winds that lift their spores into the air
• The scientists believe the same process may be used by all mushroom fungi, including those that cause diseases in plants, animals and humans 

Plants use a variety of methods to spread seeds, including gravity, forceful ejection, wind, water and animals.
 

Mushrooms have long been thought of as passive seed spreaders, releasing their spores and then relying on air currents to carry them. 

 

But new research has shown that mushrooms are able to disperse their spores over a wide area even when there is not a breath of wind - by creating their own 'weather'. 
 
U.S. scientists used high-speed filming techniques and mathematical modelling to show how oyster and Shitake mushrooms release water vapour to cool the air surrounding them, creating convection currents.  The scientists believe the same process may be used by all mushroom fungi, including those that cause diseases in plants, animals and humans.  This in turn generates winds that lift their spores into the air.

A mushroom- or toadstool - is technically the fleshy, spore-bearing, fruiting body of a fungus.  Millions of spores, microscopic single-celled 'seeds', may be produced by a single mushroom, and at least a few of these are likely to land somewhere suitable for fungal growth.  More than 80 different types of wild edible mushroom grow in the UK, as well as many poisonous species.  One of the world's deadliest mushrooms, the death cap, is a common sight in British woodland. Although pleasant tasting, just one ounce of the fungus is enough to kill.

 

Read more - http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2513292/Mushrooms-make-WEATHER-Fungi-alter-nearby-air-humidity-create-winds-spread-spores-far-wide.html
 

 

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RELATED

 

THE LARGEST ORGANISM ON EARTH IS A FUNGUS

Next time you purchase white button mushrooms at the grocery store, just remember, they may be cute and bite-size but they have a relative out west that occupies some 2,384 acres (965 hectares) of soil in Oregon's Blue Mountains. Put another way, this humongous fungus would encompass 1,665 football fields, or nearly four square miles (10 square kilometers) of turf.

 

The discovery of this giant Armillaria ostoyae in 1998 heralded a new record holder for the title of the world's largest known organism, believed by most to be the 110-foot- (33.5-meter-) long, 200-ton blue whale.

 

Based on its current growth rate, the fungus is estimated to be 2,400 years old but could be as ancient as 8,650 years, which would earn it a place among the oldest living organisms as well.

Read more - http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=strange-but-true-largest-organism-is-fungus

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WHAT ARE FUNGI?  Neither plant nor animals, nor bacteria, nor protists.  They are a separate kingdom altogether.

 

A fungus (/ˈfʌŋɡəs/; plural: fungi^[3] or funguses^[4]) is a member of a large group of eukaryotic organisms that includes microorganisms such as yeasts and molds (British English: moulds), as well as the more familiar mushrooms.

 

These organisms are classified as a kingdom, Fungi, which is separate from plants, animals, protists and bacteria. One major difference is that fungal cells have cell walls that contain chitin, unlike the cell walls of plants and some protists, which contain cellulose, and unlike the cell walls of bacteria.

 

Mycology has often been regarded as a branch of botany, even though it is a separate kingdom in biological taxonomy. Genetic studies have shown that fungi are more closely related to animals than to plants.

Source - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fungus

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