Me and Ganoderma applanatum.

Mark your calendars — I’m excited to announce I’ll be teaching “Mushrooms of the Front Range” this August 19, 21, and Sep. 4 through the Boulder County Nature Association. If you are a fan of fungi or of just expanding your natural history world in general, come join us! The course description and instructions for signing up are here — and the class size is capped at 12, so reserve your spot now.

One of the things I enjoy most about mushroom hunting is the chance it gives me to *really* get to know the forest on an intimate basis — not just the fungi, but also plants, animals, lichens, and whatevers — and how the forest changes, and what grows where, and when. If you want to understand the part of life on Earth that takes place in a forest, picking up mushroom foraying as a hobby is a great way to do it. Plus you get to see some parts of your public land that almost no one else ever sees, and that’s on top of all the bizarre things you find in the woods. Really, there are few nooks and crannies of forests near towns that haven’t been touched by man, and that detritus is sometimes sad, sometimes fascinating, and sometimes utterly bizarre. And finally, it’s so quiet and relaxing out there. If you like fishing, hiking, or meditation, you will love this. It’s kind of a hybrid. With a nerdy basket.

We’ll be holding “Mushrooms of the Front Range” in August in Boulder just after the North American Mycological Association’s 2010 annual meeting Aug. 12-15 at the YMCA of the Rockies’ Snow Mountain Ranch over by Winter Park, so I will be freshly full of new fungal ideas and tales of Colorado fungi. Speaking of that meeting, you should come if you really want to immerse yourself in the world of fungi and perhaps equally eye-opening world of fungi-lovers, spend lots of quality time seeing beautiful views, get to know the Colorado sub-alpine forest post-mountain-pine-beetle (and I won’t lie — it’s a tree graveyard in a lot of places out there), and hear all sorts of colorful lectures by world-renowned mycologists.

It will be a ridiculously affordable natural history vacation: For about $300 (if you take a bunk in a room with five others and join the Colorado Mycological Society for a mere $28 or NAMA for $35/40) you can get all the fungal knowledge/foraying you can handle; all-you-can-eat buffet meals for breakfast, lunch and dinner; and lodging for three days. Trust me, as amazing science vacations go, this is dirt cheap, and it is going to be an awesome experience, even if it’s a terrible mushroom year. And if it’s a great mushroom year, the experience will be *unforgettable*.  We may even be doing our third annual mycoblitz at Rocky Mountain National Park that week, which would allow you to take part in Citizen Science!

One final note — I have confirmed* a speaking engagement at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science for their November 3 Lunchtime Lecture series. The title has not yet been decided on, but the format will be a photographic survey of life on Earth that incorporates as much diversity as possible — one beautifully photographed organism/phylum/minute for 45 minutes with a little bit of information about each. It will be less a science talk and more a science appreciation experience. Behold, and wonder. I’ll have more information on it as the date gets closer.

* Not so confirmed after all. Maybe not happening. : ( Stay tuned.

Me and the state I love. Eccles Pass (12,435 ft) in the Gore Range, Colorado, July 3, 2009. Some of the meadows behind me were absolutely COATED with yellow glacier lilies.

I’ve been thinking of what I can do to support this year’s International Year of Biodiversity, and I’ve decided I’d like to take my “Life on Earth” lecture on the road. The talk will not be mere platitudes about biodiversity and its importance; we’re talking specifics — interesting science, weird organisms and their “alternative” lifestyles, beautiful photographs, and more natural history than you can shake a stick at. Basically, more of the same stuff you come to this blog for, plus you’d get to meet me and pick my brain in person.

I’m planning to expand the 25 minute talk I gave last year at the Colorado Skepticamp into something closer to an hour (although half an hour is still an option) that I could give at a few venues around the Front Range (or perhaps farther afield if travel stipends are involved). If you are in a group that would be interested in hearing me talk on the subject of biodiversity and life on Earth, leave a comment to this post or contact me privately at the email address listed on the Portfolio page. I can’t guarantee I’ll be able to speak for everyone who makes a request (should there BE any requests : ) ), but all requests will be carefully considered.

Back in May, I saw a call by a group of skeptics I belong to for talks at their annual meeting, the Colorado Skepticamp. The talks could be on any sort of skepticism OR on any discipline of science. One of my aims is to speak publicly and frequently on the sorts of things I blog about here, so I jumped at the chance. My idea was to do a quick survey of life on Earth hitting all the major groups in less than 30 minutes, so I called it (with apologies to Mel Brooks), “Life on Earth: The Short, Short Version.” So here you go — My 23 Minutes of Fame.

There are two versions. One has better sound:

And this version has higher resolution:

I made a few mistakes for which I hope you’ll forgive me. . . all I can say is this was my first time giving this presentation and it’s hard when your mouth is moving faster than your brain. I have noted them below. If, after watching it, any of you are interested in having me/hiring me as a speaker, I’d be happy to make it longer or shorter or elaborate on any taxon that interests you. : )

Errata/Clarifications

• I mentioned that Hennig changed the way we do taxonomy by suggesting evolution as our grounds for classification. What I forgot to mention is the way that evolutionary history has now become largely judged by DNA and not always so much by what the organisms look like, where they live, etc. The byzantine circular taxonomic trees I presented were created using DNA sequences – and molecular taxonomy now dominates classification (it’s not always the last word, but it’s almost always the opening sentence). But for all of our scientific efforts, judging the true evolutionary history — especially when different pieces of evidence conflict — can still be a bit of an art.
• The slide where I show some differences between bacteria and archaea shows a few of the differences between these groups, but there are many more. Don’t think by any means that these are the only two. I mentioned this earlier but not at this point.
• Flu viruses are in Orthomyxoviridae, not Paramyxoviridae. It’s the taxon directly above the one I point at. I was in the right neighborhood but again, the mouth was moving too fast for the brain. This is what happens when you try to cram life on Earth into 23 minutes.
• Operculum is Latin for a little lid or a cover, not Greek for cap. I knew what I meant, I just didn’t say it right.
• Moss spores are haploid, not diploid. Meiosis occurs in the the sporangium in the top of the sporophyte.
• I seem to imply all cup fungi shoot their spores in a cloud but that’s not accurate. Many cup fungi don’t. Even the ones that do may not if they’re not in the mood. In this respect, they aren’t so different from. . . er . . . never mind.
• I got a little confused on jellyfish but remembered soon after the talk what the problem is: jellyfish do not have alternation of generations in the same sense plants do. Both forms are diploid (the sperm and egg fuse before dividing further), but they do alternate between sexual and asexual organisms.
• And finally, I looked it up and Venus’s Girdles are indeed bioluminescent at night. Sorry.

Muchas gracias to Mile High Skeptics for making generously recording and sharing my lecture!