Toward the End of Time
“The brownish, writhing, mounting formations aboveground are but a fraction of its mass, made up of microscopic hyphae that extend their network in all directions, knotting and interweaving into the mycelium that makes up the thallus, or undifferentiated body, of my immense companion in vitality. It does not speak, or visibly move, but it does undergo change, the telltale mark of an organism. Its protoplasm is in constant motion, streaming into the tips of the newer hyphae, draining from the old...er, which become vacuolated and turn pulpy and a darker, more velvety brown. Though the fungus is ultimately one substance, consistent and immortal, its hyphae do organize at times into compact masses that perform various functions—stromata, for instance, cushionlike forms that bear spores, and rhizoids, anchoring the thallus to the substrate, and septa, which more or less elaborately functior as valves controlling the flow of enzyme-liquefied starches sugars, celluloses, and lignins. Since the fungus possesses no chlorophyll, it depends for nutrition entirely upon the rotting organic matter in the substrate.MoreLess
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