Stalking Mushrooms for Science

by Jennifer Frazer on September 30, 2009

That lurid orange stripe wasn't visible until vivisection. Neither were the blue maggot holes. Mmmmm. . . maggoty.

That lurid orange stripe wasn't visible until vivisection. Neither were the blue maggot holes. Mmmmm. . . maggot holes. Locations redacted to protect the innocent.

In all the excitement over the ladybugs, I completely forgot to mention I spent the weekend before scouring an undisclosed location forĀ fungi for the 2009 Rocky Mountain National Park Mycoblitz. Citizen science in action!

Our Mycoblitz was the brainchild of past Colorado Mycological Society president Rob Hallock (hi Rob!), but it is an example of an increasingly popular endeavor called a “bioblitz“. In these events, teams of volunteers and scientists sweep a few select landscapes for one to two days collecting as many organisms of particular groups as they can. They hope to get a snapshot of the biodiversity of a particular place and time.

Last year’s mycoblitz was (I believe) the first bioblitz ever held in a national park. The picture of me with the very exciting slime mold from my “About” page was taken at that event. This year we purposely chose to do the event a month later — in September — to try a capture a different assortment of fruiting fungi. And by all accounts, we succeeded. My team was able to find the first jelly fungus recorded in RMNP and a very special yell0w-staining Ganoderma — and seven of our 25 specimens found a permanent home in the herbarium in Denver.

Here are some more pictures of this year’s blitz — starting with one of some various mycoblitz ne’er do wells. . . : )

September 2009 050

One of our two identifiers was Vera Evenson, Curator of the Denver Botanic Gardens Herbarium of Fungi and author of Mushrooms of Colorado and the Southern Rocky Mountains, which I highly recommend to anyone interested in that subject. Vera’s hiding in the picture above, examining a specimen very closely. On the left you can also see the food dehydrators we used to preserve all our specimens.

Below is the other identifier, Michael Kuo of mushroomexpert.com. Michael is both an English teacher and amateur mycologist who’s written the books 100 Edible Mushrooms and Morels. Michael makes me a little embarrassed that I haven’t done more with my life.

September 2009 051

And finally, here’s our hearty crew at the campsite in Moraine Park. We were lucky enough to be there during the elk rut, and their beautiful (and sometimes comical) calls were everywhere. A few even wandered into that field in the background and we could see them with our binocs.

September 2009 053

See what you can experience by volunteering for science? Stunning views! Elk calls! Orange mushrooms! Starlight! Toasted marshmallows! Lots and lots of accession tags! Clothes that smell like smoking logs (and only that if you’re lucky!)

So keep your eyes and ears open for opportunities. Citizen science is yet another way you can serve your country, make no mistake. At this year’s blitz, a retired policeman and schoolteacher who had never done science before saw an ad about the blitz in the newspaper and just decided to show up. They joined my team and found the majority of the specimens that were chosen from our collection to be deposited in the herbarium. So watch for big opportunities like the Christmas Bird Count, or small opportunities like our little mycoblitz. Uncle Sam wants you for science, too.

Speaking of Uncle Sam, I will be doing my civic duty this weekend by visiting Washington, DC, for the first time ever. I’ll be making my pilgrimage (hopefully) to the Smithsonian, where I may just find some delights to share with you, provided they allow photography. As such, no posts until mid- to late next week.

Have a great fall weekend! Get out there and discover some weird stuff in the woods. : )

Leave a Comment

You can use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>

Previous post:

Next post: