Key Perspective On Ceratiomyxa

Day 235: I try to accommodate my loyal readers whenever possible, so in response to a request and despite what I said day before yesterday, here are more photos of Ceratiomyxa fruticulosa var. poroides, the top with a key to give a sense of scale because I forgot my measurin' stick again. Now I must point out that this is not the same Ceratiomyxa I've been photographing over the last week. No, this is a brand-new outcropping on a different log about 60 feet away. It was not visible day before yesterday, so the little buggers must have been putting in double shifts in order to build such an extensive slime-tropolis. The original colony is beginning to deteriorate, as is the Lycogala on the same stump. However, the other side of the stump has erupted with a third slime-mold species which of course I will be trying to identify as it develops.

Rebuilding A Civilization

Day 233: I promise this will be my last post of Ceratiomyxa for a while, but this is worth note. I don't know what I expected when I returned to the site less than 24 hours later, but a complete and even more elegant rebuilding of the civilization was not on the short list. I'm sure one of those minor "earthquakes" shaking Washington's seismographs was caused by my jaw hitting the forest floor. Not only had the Ceratiomyxa regenerated, it had done so in true "Doctor Who" style, retaining elements of its former persona while simultaneously establishing its own individual mark. The pillars built by the cooperating cells had become even more elaborate and textured than when I had first seen it, a greater and more glorious Phoenix arising from the ashes of its former existence. The solitary Lycogala nub in the midst of its metropolis even seemed to be drawing some sustenance and substance from the association. It was, in fact, the only remaining pink/orange member of the dozens of others I surveyed. The rest had turned brown. I regret not putting a measuring stick up against the specimen because my readers undoubtedly have misjudged the size of this magnificent slime mold. The largest mound would measure no more than 4 mm and the individual hexagonal compartments of the structure 0.05 mm at the very largest. This mass in the photo frame measures roughly 7 mm wide by 18 mm high.

Update: I am pleased to report that this occurrence of Ceratiomyxa was the first reported on Park property. The Park's official slime mold species count is now 54.

Ceratiomyxa After The Rain

Day 232: A rather dramatic electrical storm and hard rains kept me from checking up on the Ceratiomyxa until a full day had elapsed. As I had expected, the colony had begun to deteriorate, and even the associated Lycogala was merely a shadow of its former self. The slime mold had had its day. Its population had come together to feed and breed, and its constructs...the pillars and towers which were its signature structure had fairly shone in the peak of its glory. Perhaps it was already beginning to collapse at its core when I first observed it; in any event, it did not weather the storm well, and its protist civilization collapsed, leaving behind an amorphous mass of confused and decaying cells. Those which have survived and the offspring of those which bred successfully must now retreat into the protection of their deteriorated stump, there to try to recover until they can rebuild.

Hang on a minute...did you just see a metaphor run through here?

Ceratiomyxa Fruticulosa Var. Poroides

Day 230: Yesterday was a pretty exciting day. Not only did I find two nice colonies of the common slime mold Lycogala epidendrum (tomorrow's post), but I found one totally unfamiliar to me: Ceratiomyxa fruticulosa var. poroides. I have a slime mold expert to thank for the identification, a bit to my embarrassment because when I posted an earlier photo to a slime-mold identification group and identified it as Lycogala, I was referring to the single orange blob in a sea of white, dismissing the second larger organism as a phase of Lycogala. He "corrected" me, later admitting that he hadn't even noticed the orange blob. In any event, we got it sorted out and I am happy to present Ceratiomyxa fruticulosa var. poroides in all its beautiful glory. Had I not been prowling in a trailless section of forest at this specific point in time, i.e., had I come a day earlier or later, I could not have witnesses this plasmodial phase which lasts roughly 24 hours.