All About Lichen

-And check out that moss, too.  I first became fascinated by lichen when my group (rock on, Aud and Steph!) took on the entire biological history of the Cretaceous Period in eighth grade science.  That's the 80 million or so years that followed the Jurassic, and whose end marked the mass extinction not just of dinosaurs but all kinds of life.  Flowering plants, ginkgos, mammals, and marsupials all ramped up, and true grasses populated wherever there was open land.  I had previously found these pseudo-plant-fungi* beings pretty, but my appreciation swelled as I learned about their mastery of the entire world.

*Lichen is a composite organism comprised of symbiotic algae (or cyanobacteria) and fungal filaments.  Lichens grow pretty much anywhere, on anything (inside rocks; blows around in the air), and are some of the longest-living beings on the planet.  They slowly pulverize rocks into fertile soil.

Now, this description is so nicely worded, I will copy it from Wikipedia: "Lichens may have tiny, leafless branches (fruticose), flat leaf-like structures (foliose), flakes that lie on the surface like peeling paint (crustose), or other growth forms."  Just reading the word "crustose" would throw me into a ten-minute giggle in Mr. Chapple's classroom.  

Without further ado, check this shit out:

Also, continuing my adorable mushroom photo trend, I did not compose the elements of this picture -- nature just put them there this charmingly: