Wild Mushrooms I

Wild mushrooms are delicate and persistent. They help to recycle dead vegetation into rich forest soil. Some varieties (mycorrhizal fungi) even form a symbiotic relationship with trees and other plants by surrounding or penetrating their roots with their own and exchanging nutrients for carbohydrates. The networks (mycelium) of fungi roots (hyphae) even provide the means for trees to communicate with each other. Mushrooms provide food for the forest's animals and insects, and they present us with beautiful color and variety. The photographs in these four galleries were taken in Maine after unusually frequent rainfall in the summer of 2021 inspired a bumper crop of wild mushrooms that transformed the forests into an enchanted wonderland.