Ontario Fungus: Adding Color and Scent to AutumnAn Ontario fungus page may seem odd in a vacation site but this is an Ontario vacation site and Ontario is mainly about forests and wild places. In the late summer and fall, Ontario's woodlands are ablaze with color and some of that color is found at or near ground level in the fungus thriving in the warm, moist earth. As Ontario's millions of trees got through their lives, they shed leaves, branches die and fall, and, eventually, the tree itself dies. Fungus is nature's recycler, breaking down the wood into food for itself before dying and both tree and fungus add their bodies to form the rich soil.
Another example of this wonderfully colorful fungus. It's called 'chicken of the woods' because it is popularly supposed to taste like chicken -- but then everything unusual that's edible is described as 'tasting like chicken'.
Another stump with a different fungus, Lacquered Bracket, this time, I think. I'm not an expert on fungus, only an interested enthusiast. So many types, so many colors and shapes, and all of them practically ignored by all of us. If we notice them at all, it's to kill them. People are afraid of fungus, which is ridiculous. They're tiny, for the most part, harmless plants.
Here's why, leaving aside the connection with dead things, we're afraid of fungus. Some, like these Shaggy Ink Caps are only really edible while the gills are still white. When the gills turn, unwary people can mistake them for edible mushrooms.
Here's one Ontario wild mushroom you probably can eat, Agaricus bitorquis. However, unless you know what you're doing, you should buy your mushrooms at the grocery store.
Many fungus don't look anything like mushrooms so they don't raise the same alarm. Hoof fungus, or Tinder Bracket, is usually well off the ground and resembles nothing edible so people leave them alone. Despite their appearance many of these tree-growing mushrooms actually are edible, like the Chicken-of-the-wood above.
Sometimes when I'm out taking pictures, I see pictures that just have to be taken. This one made me smile.
This fungus was on many of the tree stumps in Sandy Bay Park, Wolfe Island, on the day we visited in
spring.
If you enjoyed these small examples of Ontario fungus or 'wildlife', you may enjoy our Ontario Wildlife page or our Ontario birds page. Return to Home Page from Ontario fungus
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This chicken-of-the-woods (or Sulphur Polypore) is a good example, growing from the decaying stump of an old tree and hastening the stump'sreturn to the soil.
The markings and subtle colors of these small Zoned Rosette fungus (I think) look like petals of an autumn flower, a chrysanthemum for example.
