By Frank Kaczmarek Winter is far a far cry from being prime mushroom hunting season. Most fungi stop producing mushrooms, or fruiting bodies, in early autumn, and their hyphae (filamentous structures that are the main part of the fungal body) […]
Tag: By Frank Kaczmarek
How to preserve a snowflake
By Frank Kaczmarek Wilson Bentley (1865-1931) lived his entire life in Jericho, Vermont, where he developed a passion for snowflakes at an early age. He started by collecting snowflakes and trying to create detailed drawings of each one, but the […]
It takes gall(s) to make this ink
By Frank Kaczmarek What do the following items have in common: the Declaration of Independence, Da Vinci’s notebooks, Bach’s musical scores, Rembrandt’s drawings, Shakespeare’s plays, and the Magna Carta? Give up? These examples, along with countless other documents ranging from […]
Fungi and fairy rings appear
By Frank Kaczmarek My German mother was a highly superstitious soul, especially when it came to the natural world. Case in point, one day a “fairy ring” of mushrooms appeared in our yard. My mother became agitated and told me […]
How flowers get their color
By Frank Kaczmarek Sunlight exposes a palette of colors To quote the French dramatist Jean Giradoux, “The flower is the poetry of reproduction. It is an example of the eternal seductiveness of life.” Flowering plants fill our summer fields and […]
Sundews are diminutive but deadly
By Frank Kaczmarek In 1860, a year after publication of his seminal work on the origin of species, Charles Darwin wrote to a friend, “At the moment, I care more about Drosera than the origin of all the species in […]