the.com/fungus
life's quiet middle child, neither plant nor animal, secretly running the entire planet underground
means A fungus is any member of a vast kingdom of spore-producing organisms — molds, mushrooms, yeasts, mildews — that feed by absorbing nutrients from the world around them rather than making their own food.
from Straight from Latin 'fungus,' meaning mushroom — which the Romans themselves may have borrowed from Greek 'sphongos,' meaning sponge, a nod to the soft, porous, water-drinking texture of the things. So the very name quietly admits we mistook these creatures for something spongy and plant-like long before we understood they were a kingdom all their own.
- largest organism
- Oregon fungus spans nearly four square miles
- kingdom kin
- closer to animals than to plants
- underground internet
- fungal networks shuttle nutrients between trees
- ancient giants
- prehistoric fungi grew twenty feet tall
- decomposer royalty
- without them, dead matter would never rot away
ophiocordyceps unilateralis — parasite fungus that controls carpenter ant behavior in thai rainforests
armillaria ostoyae — largest organism on earth, 2,385 acres in oregon's malheur national forest
candida auris — drug-resistant fungus causing hospital outbreaks globally since 2009
batrachochytrium dendrobatidis — chytrid fungus that has driven over 100 amphibian species to extinction