Geoff Lay has been bushwalking with a camera throughout Australia for over 40 years. To improve his keen interest in fungi and plants, he has been a member of the Field Naturalist Club of Victoria Fungus group and of the Australian Plants Society for many years. For the last 10 years he has worked voluntarily at the Herbarium in the Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne with the Senior Mycologists and Botanists. He has given talks on Fungus to many of the Field Naturalist and Australian Plant Societies in Victoria and interstate, as well as other organisations such as Greening Australia. He is regularly asked to return.Geoff explained that fungus don’t have common names, only scientific names are used. They are neither plants nor animals. They don’t contain chlorophyll; they get their energy from rotting things, not from the sun. There are about 500 000 different types in Australia but the vast majority are microscopic. About half of the 100 000 macro (discernable) fungi are named and they are found all around the world, from the desert to the snow. Fungi start off as microscopic threads on rotting wood or leaves and come in a huge variety of colours, made of proteins called chitons, which grow outwards and produce chemicals which rots whatever it is growing on and release energy as fruiting bodies, which are over 90% water.The fruiting body holds spores which fall off and germinate and it reproduces.Fairy Rings are not a myth! They do come up in a circle, which increases over years.Fungus grow on wood, dung, grass, rich soil and other media. Parasitic fungus grow on caterpillars found under black wattle and kill the caterpillars. Fungi growing on trees intercept the sap and will eventually kill the tree and continue to live on the dead tree for up to forty years.Fungi require oxygen and moisture and seek damaged trees to attack. It eats wood from dead trees but can also aid living trees in low-nutrient soils.
