Slime Molds On OPB

Day 82: Roughly a year and a half ago, I was approached through the Park by a a filmographer from Oregon Public Broadcasting who wanted to know if I would be interested in helping him create a documentary on slime molds. Of course I said yes, but covid threw a monkey wrench in the works and it wasn't until May this last year that we were able to start planning for a field trip. I was worried that we wouldn't be able to find any. They aren't exactly predictable. As it turned out, the date the film crew picked couldn't have been better. We found at least six species, and they were pleased with the material they'd gathered for the documentary. They told me then that it probably wouldn't air until after the first of the year, possibly not until spring. Well, the video was released today. You can watch it on their channel on You Tube: Slime Molds Are Gorgeous

Slime Mold Hunters

Day 233: The Oregon Field Guide team called it a wrap late yesterday afternoon after a full day of searching for slime molds in a half-mile stretch of trailless woods. Here, cinematographer Stephanie focuses a Probe lens on a colony of Tubifera ferruginosa while producer Ian checks her framing of the shot. We were able to add three more species to the documentary: Tubifera ferruginosa (the orange patches in the lower right of the image), Arcyria denudata and Trichia decipiens, the latter two also new to the species inventory of this property. We also found many more examples of Lycogala epidendrum and Ceratiomyxa fruticulosa. Our total of five species was more than I'd expected, and I don't know who was more delighted when both members of the crew made their own discoveries unassisted by me. Ian was a little disappointed that we failed to find the infamous and fairly common Fuligo septica. "I never thought I'd hear myself say this," he told me, laughing. "I really wanted to find Dog-vomit."

Ceratiomyxa's Starring Role

Day 232: Yesterday marked the first day that I worked with the film crew from Oregon Field Guide for a segment featuring slime molds. I was rather concerned that the stars of the show would fail to appear, because only last Friday, I went on a concerted search for slimes in the area and found nothing but a collapsed colony of Lycogala epidendrum. It didn't bode well. When I arrived at our meeting location, the cinematographer (Stephanie) was already there and had begun getting her gear out. I took advantage of the time we had before Ian was due to arrive to explore the immediate area, and was delighted when I found a large patch of Ceratiomyxa fruticulosa var. poroides, perhaps my favourite of all slime molds. I reported back to Stephanie that the team wouldn't have to return to Portland skunked. After Ian arrived, they moved their gear to the site and we began filming. I seized a moment while Stephanie was using a Probe lens to capture this photo of her and Ceratiomyxa. We found a small grouping of Lycogala nearby, providing a second species for the documentary. Later in the day, we picked a quiet spot in the woods for the "interview" portion of the segment where Ian and Stephanie both grilled me with questions about slime molds and my interest in them. Today, we resume our search in a different spot. Wish us luck!

Tubifera Ferruginosa, Raspberry Slime

Day 251: If you only knew what it takes for me to bring you these daily excursions into the marvelous realm of botany! With voluntary isolation de rigueur (at least for me), the area within walking distance of my home has become my playground. I'm taking the opportunity to explore it in depth, and by that, I mean waist-deep in ferns and prickly Oregon grape. These woods are trailless but for the short sections where deer or elk have avoided the tangle of fallen trees, walking single file for fifty yards or so, then to disperse and browse at leisure. A deer's legs are much longer than mine, and what they might step over becomes a gymnastic exercise for me, heaving myself from one side of a log to another, uncertain of what might or might not afford me a step down where I hope to find it. Nor do I go in a straight line from Point A to Point B, navigating instead on a tack port or starboard to avoid insurmountable obstacles and impenetrable thickets. I cover a lot of territory, if not any great linear distance, and it is this which keeps my ramblings interesting. That said, I decided to explore a new section of forest which in the past I have only visited in Chanterelle season (and then, only in part). I call it the "middle terrace," one of three levels between the highway and the river.

I spent the better part of two hours in examination of the middle terrace, and as the morning wore on and I had seen not a single thing worthy of a photo or botanical essay, I began to despair. When I poured myself out through a hillside of Oregon grape and landed in the maintenance area, I was seriously rethinking the need to breach the next section to try to re-find Tarzetta so I could mark it with the GPS (I'm good...I found it...a  single 10 mm white marble in acres of woods). I dived back into the woods at the Ceratiomyxa Stump, found Molly Eye-Winker's log and a nice crop of Lycogala epidendrum, and then...hang on...what's that orange bit? Right in the middle of my line of travel, dotting a decaying branch I'd stepped over less than 48 hours previously, was a slime mold. As it turns out, it's a new one for me: Tubifera ferruginosa, Raspberry Slime.

Now the interesting part of this is that while I was scouting the middle terrace, I found nothing worth note except perhaps for a common facultative mycoheterotroph, and only one specimen of it. Yet within 100 yards of the Ceratiomyxa Stump, I had four slime molds (Tubifera, Lycogala, more Ceratiomyxa and previously, Fuligo septica) plus fungus Molly. What IS it about that locale? That question will likely remain unanswered, but I do know one thing: there's no need to go back to the middle terrace until it's time for Chanterelles.

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.

Lycogala Log

Day 231: Lycogala epidendrum ("Wolf's-milk") is a slime mold, despite its resemblance to a fungus. What is the difference? Well, a fungus is a single life-form. What we see and call a "mushroom" is its fruiting body. The main part of its structure is in the soil or other substrate, i.e., the mycelium, and that "body" may extend for a surprising distance. On the other hand, a slime mold is a group of single-celled organisms which have come together to feed and breed in response to chemical signals transmitted by others of their kind. Unlike the mushrooms in your collection basket, slime molds are capable of movement. They are also capable of communication in the form of those chemical signals I just mentioned, and they are capable of cooperation. This places them in a unique position cladistically, having at some point branched off from the Archaea to follow their own evolutionary path as the bacteria went the other way. Although the terms Protist and Protoctista are now considered obsolete, slime molds can be referred to as "protists" because their cellular structure is unlike that of plants, animals or fungi. Many of them spend most of their lives within their chosen substrate, as does the Ceratiomyxa of yesterday's post. I suspect that Lycogala behaves in a similar fashion because I find it in the same locations year after year. It emerges only during its breeding time. A "spent" colony can be seen as a black mass above the fresh pink "fruit" in this photo.

Leocarpus Fragilis On Usnea Sp.

Day 359: If you were a slime mold, you would begin life as a single cell, having "hatched" (as it were) from a spore. Like any self-respecting cell, you would grow by fission. After reaching a certain state, you might encounter another compatible cell and, after a suitable cellular courtship, you'd join with it in a second biologic process called fusion. This fusion (similar to that of sperm and egg) would include the respective nuclei of both partners. The resultant diploid zygote would then feed and grow, its nuclei redividing and increasing, eventually resulting in a structure known as a plasmodium: a single multi-nucleate amoeboid cell. When various environmental factors align (food supply, temperature, light level, moisture, pH), the fruiting process is initiated (shown here in Leocarpus fragilis on an Usnea lichen). Inside the fruiting bodies, the protoplasm separates into units each containing a single nucleus. These undergo further division reduction until what remains of each unit is a haploid spore. When the sporangia (spore capsules) rupture, the spores are dispersed and the process begins again. That said, some slime molds have a secondary reproductive strategy to ensure the continuation of their species, and they will continue to populate the Earth long after we humans, so convinced of our own importance, are gone to dust.