Science
A Nod to Carnivorous Mushrooms
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Last week’s research on carnivorous plants led to another discovery: carnivorous mushrooms.
Living mushrooms eat dead people.
But mushrooms also use threadlike hyphae that make up the mycelium of a fungus. Those strings decompose decaying matter and trap microscopic organisms that might otherwise eat the luscious mushrooms above.
“When a browsing nematode…puts its head into this miniature noose, pressure sensors in the ring cells [of the hyphae] detect it and set in motion the springing of the trap.”¹
What, then, is stopping us from writing more about man-eating mushrooms?
[1] Nissan, Ephraim. “Deadly Flowers and Lethal Plants. A Theme in Folklore, Fiction and Metaphoric Imagery.” Fabula, vol. 50, no. 3–4, 2009, pp. 293–311, https://doi.org/10.1515/FABL.2009.024.
