Drive | Brutkey

No-one knows when lichens first evolved. The earliest fossils date from just over 400 million years ago, but it’s possible that lichen-like organisms occurred before this. Lichens have evolved independently between nine and twelve times since. Today, one in five of all known fungal species form lichens, or ‘lichenise’. Some fungi (such as Penicillium moulds) used to lichenise but don’t any more; they have de-lichenised. Some fungi have switched to different types of photosynthetic partner — or re-lichenised — over the course of their evolutionary histories. For some fungi, lichenisation remains a lifestyle choice; they can live as lichens or not. depending on their circumstances.

0a49dcb5764acee5.mp4 Cover of Merlin Sheldrake's book Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds, and Shape Our Futures. It's black, with white and yellow text, and an illustration by Job Wouter of various fungal bodies and mycelium in bold yellow, red, blue, and white. Quotes by Helen MacDonald: "Urgent, astounding and necessary"; and Robert Macfarlane: "Dazzling, vibrant, vision changing".

Cover of Merlin Sheldrake's book Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds, and Shape Our Futures. It's black, with white and yellow text, and an illustration by Job Wouter of various fungal bodies and mycelium in bold yellow, red, blue, and white. Quotes by Helen MacDonald: "Urgent, astounding and necessary"; and Robert Macfarlane: "Dazzling, vibrant, vision changing".

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