Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds and Shape Our Futures

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Layers of dead and un-rotted forest built up, storing so much carbon that atmospheric carbon dioxide levels crashed, and the planet entered a period of global cooling. Plants had caused the climate crisis, and plants were hit the hardest by it: Huge areas of tropical forest were wiped out in an extinction event known as the Carboniferous rainforest collapse. The mycelial networks in the ground “compute” information encoded in spikes of electrical activity, allowing plants to communicate with each other. When an aphid begins eating the leaves of a plant, it can send out an alarm to others of its kind through the mycelial network, prompting them to put off chemicals that will keep the aphids away. Hsu, Hua (18 May 2020). "The Secret Lives of Fungi". The New Yorker. Archived from the original on 8 September 2020 . Retrieved 31 August 2020.

The tips circulate “information”, and, in response, the mycelium makes advantageous changes to its behaviour. This is more than mere chemical reaction. Here is a responsive entity with interests that its actions can serve or harm. Sheldrake tries out the idea of swarm-intelligence, but a swarm consists of separate individuals, whereas the network of fused or entangled hyphae functions as a physical whole – or much more like a physical whole. Studying fungi makes these lines harder to draw.If your child is a visual learner then Mushrooms of the World with Pictures to Color by Jeanette Bowers and David Arora is the perfect fungi book for them. Lichens – a fascinating chapter which explores their existence as a symbiotic relationship (now often called mutualism) between a fungus and an alga

Nearly 2400 species are illustrated in full colour, with detailed notes on how to correctly identify them, including details of similar, confusing species. they describe fossilized mycelium preserved in the fractures of ancient lava flows. The fossils show branching filaments that "touch and entangle each other." The "tangled network" they form, the dimensions of the hyphae, the dimensions of spore-like structures, and the pattern of its growth all closely resemble modern-day fungal mycelium. It is an extraordinary discovery because the fossils date from 2.4 billion years ago, more than a billion years before fungi were thought to have branched off the tree of life.Takeaways: I want to know more! This book enchanted me, took me on an entangled journey, demonstrated earth-shifting realizations, and showed me just how much I still have no inkling of. It left me in a mood that rhymes with our mycelial friends: I’ve just eaten a mouthful, a stomachful, but I want more, more, more. Fungi produce plant growth hormones that manipulate roots, causing them to proliferate into masses of feathery branches—with a greater surface area, the chances of an encounter between root tips and fungal hyphae become more likely. Where to find: Usually found low on the trunk of old, living oak trees and sweet chestnut trees, and sometimes on their stumps. Recommended Reading/Guides: What I didn't know before reading this book, aside from how they appear like magic, is that mushrooms are the fruit of fungi. Like an apple which lies on an orchard floor waiting to be eaten and its seeds dispersed through the intestines of a bird, the mushroom is full of spores that need to be distributed farther afield.

I knew a few things about the so-called wood wide web, that fungi is closer to animal than to vegetal, and that the mushrooms we see are only the metaphorical tip of a very large and complex fungi iceberg, but “Entangled Life” took me much deeper – mushrooms, as it turns out, are even more fascinating than I had thought! An up-to-date, comprehensive and brilliantly illustrated book on fungi foraging in Britain and Europe. It covers every known edible species, and all the poisonous groups, as well as a few other extremely common ones. We commonly think of animals and plants as matter, but they are really systems through which matter is constantly passing."I really would have liked to have seen the author's own work be much more emphasized. Sheldrake is a biologist, or at least he has a Ph.D., but much of this book is just shallow interviews with other scientists, like you'd get from any journalist. Fungi not only give us penicillin, they also give us statins to lower cholesterol and many powerful antiviral and anticancer compounds You will learn here how to grow oyster mushrooms out of baby poop (removing the plastic from the diapers first, of course), how mushrooms can 'consume' Saddam Hussein's VX gas, degrade pesticides and remove infectious diseases like E. coli. Appearing on the “Best of 2018” lists of big names like Globe and Mail and Quill & Quire, The Mushroom Fan Club is an imaginative and illustrative children’s book by Elise Gravel. The story is about mushroom hunting, one of the author’s favorite family pastimes. Instead of focusing on science, however, Gravel unweaves the wonder of mushrooming by turning all life forms into English-speaking, curious characters in the story. It will change the way you think, not only about fungi, but how you approach thinking about anything that is a given.