Geology Reference
In-Depth Information
duced—some bracket fungi growing out of trees can release some 30 thousand million
spores each day.
The fungal kingdom has far more species than are in the plant and animal kingdoms
combined. There may be 16 million species of fungi, of which only a tiny fraction has
been recognised and given names by humans. Fungi grow in and on a variety of mater-
ials. Some love soil, others living or dead leaves, others wood, dead or alive, and yet
others the living flesh of animals and plants. Some are cultivated by animals such as
beetles, ants and termites; others cultivate and even kill animals in their turn. Three ba-
sic lifestyles can be adopted by any given species, often not exclusively: fungi can be
decomposers/scavengers; they can enter into various kinds of mutually beneficial part-
nerships with other organisms like the mycorrhizal fungi to which we shall soon return;
or they can be parasites/predators. Each fungal lifestyle has myriad implications for the
way carbon and other atoms journey around the planet, and hence fungal lives affect all
our lives by modifying the climate of the earth.
Brains in the soil
Fungi possess an eerie intelligence, and probably a peculiar sense of self to boot. This
is in part because the fusions between individual hyphae in a mycelium, which can be
either tip to tip or tip to side, allow fungi to create networks of phenomenal communic-
ative power that strongly resemble our blood system or the neuronal connections in our
brains. The parallel with the nervous system is more than merely metaphorical, for, like
bacteria, mycelia are in some sense sentient and aware. According to Paul Stamets, the
well-known American mycologist, mycelia are nothing less than the “neurological net-
work of nature” which sense the movements of organisms upon the land and the impact
of falling tree branches on the ground (potential food for decomposing fungi) thanks to
complex molecules that course through the communal spaces of their intercommunicat-
ing pipelines. Mycologists Alan Rayner and Christian Taylor describe fungi as 'brains in
the soil' that have no need of the bodily appendages and organs which encumber animals
such as ourselves. Fungi lack our sense organs and our high degree of neurological de-
velopment, but they have a keen taste for the chemical environment around them. Like
all good brains, fungi solve problems (where to find food and mates, and with whom to
make partnerships). Fungi think slowly. They lack the fast track neuronal paraphernalia
of the animal kingdom, but this gives them the breathing space to attune harmoniously
with their circumstances instead of jumping to inapt conclusions.
Until recently, mycelia were seen as mechanical, predictable systems with no inher-
ent intelligence or creativity, rather like the pipelines we humans make to transport gas,
