62 Nature Notes
Time for change…. Woodlands are busy places at this time of year. Leaves are falling, animals and birds are scurrying around scavenging for nuts and food. Underground there is a complex web of roots, fungi and bacteria connecting trees and plants with mushrooms sprouting up through the damp woodland floor.
The F-Word Without fungi, animals and plants could not exist. Fungi can be good, bad, microscopic or enormous and they are essential ecological powerhouses which exist everywhere and not just underground. Their uses in the biosphere are potentially endless appearing in the kitchen (eg. yeast, coffee and cheese) as well as in the medicinal world (penicillin, anti-inflammatories and statins - to name but a few).
Fungi facts:
● Fungi have their own kingdom of life but are more closely related to animals than plants.
● Not all fungi produce mushrooms. Mushrooms are just the flowering part of a fungus which can breathe oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide just like animals.
● Some fungi can glow in the dark and some can store carbon.
● They are nature’s decomposers, making soil and circulating nutrients but they can also break down rock, plastics explosives like TNT and radioactive waste.
●New species of fungi are found every year – over 15,000 species have been recorded in the UK but it’s thought there are millions more yet to be discovered.
● They continue to drive sustainable innovation, from eco-friendly packaging to mycelium insulation.
Yellow brain
Jays Even as the most colourful member of the crow family Eurasian Jays aren’t always easy to spot. If you are in or near broadleaf woodland you will no doubt hear their screech- ing call in autumn months when they are busy burying acorns – some of which they retrieve later in the year whilst the forgotten ones are left to grow into oak trees. These shy, secretive birds (pinkish, buff body, with black and white wings and a striking blue patch) are famous mimics imitating the calls of other birds like owls or sparrowhawks as well as manmade sounds such as car alarms.
Sources: BBC, The Woodland Trust, Plantlife, The Tree Council, Devon Wildlife Trust Dead man’s fingers Jelly Ears
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geograph-6285855-by-Evelyn-Simak
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