The Nutrient Cycle - Soil: Reflections on the Basis of our Existence - page 87

Towards new goals . Wood breaks down fast in rainforests, where constant humidity and heat pro-
vide perfect conditions for decomposer fungi. In northern forests, fallen tree trunks can remain
on the ground for centuries, whereas in the rainforest they disappear in a few years. The image
shows fungal fruit bodies sticking up from a rainforest tree trunk like knobbly black fingers.
A similar species in Europe and North America is called dead man's fingers
During the second day's hike I spotted a palm leaf hanging like a dirty rag over
a liana. The greyish-white leaf was covered in fungal mycelia that caused it to
disintegrate into powdery scales when I touched it. On the edge of the leaf grew
small white fruiting bodies that had already obtained the nutrition they needed to
emit spores that would disperse to find new organic matter to colonise. The indig-
enous people uses these palm leaves to weave baskets in which they carry their
few worldly possessions on their rainforest wanderings.
Mushrooms are everywhere in the rainforest. Lovely clusters of small brown fruit-
ing bodies with sparse hyphae connected by brown threads carpeted the enormous
plank root of a kapok tree, the rainforest's majestic giant. The mushrooms were of
the genus Marasmius and turned my thoughts to Sweden's spruce forests, where car-
pets of needles can be covered with tiny stinking parachutes, a close relation from the
same genus. Pick up a stinking parachute and it will be attached to a spruce needle
that it is breaking down. In Sweden, though, the decomposition process is slow; even
after ten years, a third of the needle's mass may remain as a permanent residue.
Giant Trees Topple in the Dead of Night
A huge crash woke me in the middle of the third night. A kapok tree had fallen,
bringing down several other trees nearby. Rainforest biodiversity benefits from the
disruption caused by falling trees, and the resultant clearings create space for more