Sunday, February 14, 2021

A Binomial Nomenclaturely Correct Review of Singaporean Fungi and more

We've been jungling again.
If you look closer, there is creepy.
Aaah, the twisteraty life-crushing vine has encased someone's human hand! The horror! There continue to be many dangers. I'm afraid that reading today's blog may pose the danger of boredom, however...
Your feedback is important to us. Laura in Singapore responds in fleeting ways to feedback. You wanted betters speciesidentification. Let's start with a picture of a Senna alata, above, commonly called the Christmas-candle flower, where some formicidae are feeding. Below is a Mimosa pudica, or sensitive plant which will shut up its leaves if you express your frustration or weight. Its fluffer puffball (ok, sic.) flowers are less touchy.
We saw our first ever wild pea flower. But my mother and the Internet, who agree with Raed on the species thing, kindly confirmed that this cannot be called a butterfly pea flower, as it's a lighter blue. So suck it! It is still named Clitoria ternatea, named after the human part of a similar name, whose full structure was not known until 2005. Shocking? I think not.
Speaking of human body parts, I had discarded this monsoon-logged photo until the glories of Basidomycota nomenclature were revealed to me. Below is a Phallus indusiatus, Bamboo Fungus, or the Basket variety of Stinkhorn. Did you now that Stinkhorns have a veil? The cap exudes a smelly, sticky, sweet liquid that attracts insects which then unwittingly spread the spores. You know, like a boring-ass flower, except the bugs get get athlete's foot.
Here, a cluster of Cookeina speciosa jelly fungi teach us about the Temuans people of Penninsular Malaysia, who reportedly used some genus as food and fishing bait. Don't be eating them, as my genus expertise is limited, and so is yours.
The push-button mushrooms below are called Lentinus sajor-caju. The real issue in cultivator-mycology, you know, is the persistent misapplication of the name Pleurutus sajor-caju, even in scientific texts! I dedicate this part of the blog to Raed, who told me to look up the names o'stuff.
Let's spend some time with the gandoderma. Above, the Ganoderma tropicum (Junghuhn) Bresadola (which I would have called the shiny shoeshroom), and below, the Ganoderma sp. 6, which gets a lamer name given its lack of sparkle. In case you were trying, you can differentiate Ganoderma from other polypores due to their double-walled basidiospore, which should be obvious.
The Favolus Roseus Lloyd was discovered in 1922, and were fantastically boring thereafter. According to Wikipedia, the fruit bodies of Favolus fungi are annual, and have a stipe that is situated laterally to substipitate or almost sessile. The shape of the cap is spatulate (with a broad, rounded end), reniform (kidney shaped) to dimidiate (divided into two equal parts). So there's that.
Here, we have something less obvious in the Clavulina genus, perhaps Clavulina cristata, but who really cares?
Let's continue this nonsense with a beautiful specimen of the, oh my god, I have no idea. Raed, my blog creation has gone from 1 hour to many just in fungaldentification! I haven't even moved onto preferred kingdoms such as, say, animals or plants!
On that note, I hope that you had an exceptional level of fun with this kingdom of Fungi learning. Perhaps you'd like to try the rest on your own? Let's start off with a super-cool multilegged, bug-killing waddler.
For this one, I'll give you a clue, it's in the Tricholomataceae family, I think.
And for a final challenge, perhaps some crusty bark itchers ?
#nomorefungiforme #laurainsingapore.