» 2006 » October
Eating the Chicken of the Woods
Chicken-of-the woods is hard to miss in the forest, being bright orange on top and yellow underneath. It’s a good beginner’s mushroom, has a texture like chicken, and apparently it makes a tasty omelet too.
Cabbage monstrosities
The things that were once called Fungi but aren’t anymore are legion. Here’s one of them, a little swimmy thing that causes clubroot of cabbage. It gives cabbage monstrously clubbed roots, and as a bonus, acts as a vector for other diseases. Although we love its monstrous cruelty, we have banished it from the kingdom of Fungi. Be gone!
Introducing Ganoderma lucidum and G. tsugae
This foray into the mycology of Chinese traditional medicine was written by a student in PLPA 319.
For 7,000 years, mushrooms have been used in traditional Chinese medicines. One mushroom in particular, Ganoderma lucidum (known as Ling Chih in China and Reishi in Japan), has been used extensively to treat a variety of conditions from insomnia [...]
Daedaleopsis confragosa and the Minotaur
This expedition into classical mythology/mycology was penned by Stephanie Gautama, a student in PLPA 319.
Daedaleopsis confragosa, the thin-maze polypore, is a tough brown bracket fungus that grows on dead wood or wounded living trees. It is a white rot fungus, meaning that it digests lignin–a tough component of plant cell walls–and leaves the rotted wood [...]
Giant puffballs, Calvatia gigantea
Giant puffballs are seldom confused with anything but soccer balls, so they’re a good beginner mushroom. However, to me they taste a bit like styrofoam packing chips, but not everyone agrees with me…
Hypholoma sublateritium—edible?
By Fudy Chang-Fu Chen, an intrepid PLPA 319 student, also soon to be a graduate of the Cornell School of Hotel Administration
What is important in the ‘taste’ of mushrooms is the means by which they are gathered, and the symbolic value of that collection, rather than taste per se. —Gary Alan Fine1
Hypholoma sublateritium, commonly [...]
Time lapse stink
Here’s something I know you’ve all been dying to see. A video of one of the most compellingly jaw-dropping spectacles in mycology, condensed from four days of electrifying footage. What you can’t see is the stink, the awesome stink associated with this event. It caused our noble departmental photographer, Kent Loeffler, to vent [...]
Lemon lapse time rot
Citrus fruits aren’t too easy to decay. They have thick rinds that’re chock full of aromatic essential oils that suppress most fungi. They’re alive, and can activate various defense responses to thwart invaders. Enter Penicillium digitatum, a mold that specializes in Citrus. It’d be hard to get away with saying this one’s [...]
Complementary Colors–Hemlock rust
I am fortunate to live in a grove of hemlock trees by a babbling stream. A soft, blue-green hemlock light embraces me as I drive home in the evenings. In June, however, bright orange stars appear in the hemlocks. Amid the healthy turquoise hemlock cones, some wear a dense powdery coat of orange aeciospores.
This fungus, [...]