Some mushrooms can glow in the dark, like this one in the Indonesian rainforest at night.
Image: Wildlife
They can break down nuclear waste, are excellently networked and have 23,000 genders: no wonder that mushrooms have become the beacon of hope of the present.
Dhe largest living creature known to exist on earth is a fungus. It’s said to be as big as 1,200 soccer fields, but you can’t see much of it. The fungus lives underground. It is estimated to be 2,400 years old but was only discovered 22 years ago, in a national forest in Oregon, USA, where it branches through the soil as mycelium – a network of filamentous fungal cells. The genus to which it belongs, honey fungus, sounds friendly, but the giant fungus is also called the “killer” because it draws nutrients from the trees above it, destroying them. But by also feeding on wood, which is already dead through no fault of his own, he also practices meaningful material recycling at the same time. Hidden as it is, it has a massive impact on the environment.
Where we are, fungi have already been there, underground, around us, in our bodies and what we take into them. They belong to a separate kingdom of organisms, are neither plants nor animals, although they are genetically closer to them.