We love fungi's other-worldliness
and are happy that they are finally getting the attention they deserve. Fungi are brilliant at breaking down difficult compounds, like cellulose, allowing
others to use the nutrients and energy trapped within the materials. These materials are unavailable until the fungi get to work.
In our community garden they are breaking
down all sorts, but the fruiting bodies in our garden are mostly associated with
our abundance of old logs, especially on the Hugelkultur mound where
logs had been buried.
In addition to breaking materials, fungi form massive
networks in our soil, distributing nutrients, water and more. They are also a
social network as plants connect and pass information through the mycelium.This mass of fungal mycelium criss-crossing the land under our feet is now
known as the Wood Wide Web. You can learn more here.
We are a garden closely linked to
permaculture, and as much of permaculture is
about designing for sustainable living through learning from and copying nature, perhaps we can learn from and copy our fungal friends as we work together in our garden.
In this Soil Food Web School Blog, they reflect on the wisdom of fungal interactions and how four principles of stable mutualistic partnerships in nature might apply to helping humans create a more harmonious society.
Principle One: Both organisms in an enduring partnership receive net benefits in a reinforcing feedback loop.
Principle Two: Partners trade different resources or services.
Principle Three: Each partner organism can readily provide the resources they collect in abundance.
Principle Four: Partners respond and adapt to each other and their changing environments and contexts.
Yes we can learn from and copy that!
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