Mysterious Mushrooms: A Text for Students

 When my daughter was 3, we had a particularly wet fall, which led to masses of white mushrooms growing in our lawn. Ever the vigilant parent, I tried to impress upon her that the mushrooms were not to be eaten. She took my warnings a bit too much to heart, however, and for the next month would not even run in the part of the yard with the mushrooms. Evidently I had scared her a little bit too much!

On our nature hikes, I tried to remedy this situation by pointing out interesting and beautiful mushrooms. Eventually she overcame her early fears and even joined us in that great d
elight of childhood, poking puffballs with a stick. If you're not familiar with these awesome mushrooms, puffballs give off a cloud of "smoke" (actually spores) once they have dried out. 

I noticed that some of my students shared my daughter's early mushroom fears, so I decided to write about mushrooms as part of a unit on summarizing. This text also covers some key science information! For the formatted version of the text plus activities, click here: Paraphrasing and Summarizing Lessons for Nonfiction Reading.

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Mysterious Mushrooms

If April showers bring May flowers, what do September showers bring?

Mushrooms!

In many places across the United States, a wet end to summer leads to many, many mushrooms. They grow in forests. They grow on lawns. They even pop up out of the mulch around playgrounds! 

But what are mushrooms, really? Are they plants? Are they poisonous? Should we be afraid of these autumn mysteries?

Mushrooms: More like an apple than a tree

Mushrooms are not plants. In fact, the mushroom that you see is only a part of a larger organism called a fungus. (When we talk about more than one fungus, we call them fungi.)

Fungi have long strands called hyphae that grow underground. These hyphae feed on dead matter. In rainy weather, some kinds of fungi send up mushrooms. While it seems like the mushrooms appear overnight, they’re actually just a part of a larger organism—the fungus. This is why the mushroom is more like the apple than the tree.

Apples have seeds. These seeds are how trees reproduce. Then what do fungi have? Instead of seeds, fungi have spores. Mushrooms produce the tiny spores. Spores float away on the wind. Some settle on the ground and grow new fungi.

Poisonous or edible?

Everyone has heard of poisonous mushrooms. It’s true—there are some kinds of mushrooms that can be deadly. But millions of people pick and eat wild mushrooms every year with no problems.

Mushroom hunters must know which kinds of mushrooms are safe, and which are deadly. Many wild mushrooms hunters stick to a few very common, very safe varieties. These mushrooms are almost impossible to confuse with a deadly mushroom. 

Mushroom hunters also must take good field guides with them when they are looking for mushrooms. It’s not enough to just match a picture. Mushroom hunters read about where edible mushrooms can be found, what they look like, and what their stalks and spore prints are like. They have to look at several sources of information to be sure that a mushroom is safe.

When people aren’t careful, they can become very sick or even die from eating the wrong mushroom. Every year, some people end up in the hospital after eating the Death Cap mushroom. This mushroom looks like a safe kind of mushroom from Asia. People who know the safe mushroom think that the Death Cap mushroom must be safe to eat. Sadly, this isn’t the case. 

Some people worry that just touching a poisonous mushroom can be deadly. Luckily, for most mushrooms, the poison cannot be absorbed through the skin. If you don’t eat the mushroom, you can’t be poisoned. Some mushrooms can irritate the skin, however, so it's always important to be careful.

Fungi and Trees

No one really knows how many kinds of fungi exist in North America. About 10,000 species have been described, but there might be more than twice as many. 

What scientists do know is that fungi are important to forest ecosystems. Fungi help to break down dead leaves and wood. Some kinds of fungi live next to the roots of certain trees. The fungi help the trees to get minerals and moisture, while the tree gives the fungi nutrients. Gardeners can even buy beneficial fungi to put in the soil around trees. These fungi help the trees to grow. 

Next autumn, try looking for mysterious mushrooms around your house!

by Emily Kissner

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