USES OF MUSHROOMS. 233 



by cutting limbs smooth and close to the trunk, and then painting 

 the smooth surface with some lead paint. 



While we are thus apt to regard many of the mushrooms as 

 enemies of the forest, they are, at the same time, of incalculable use 

 to the forest. The mushrooms are nature's most active agents in 

 the disposal of the forest's waste material. Forests that have de- 

 veloped without the guidance of man have been absolutely dependent 

 upon them for their continued existence. Where the species of 

 mushrooms are comparatively few which attack living trees, there 

 are hundreds of kinds ready to strike into fallen timber. There is a 

 degree of moisture present on the forest floor exactly suited to the 

 rapid growth of the mycelium of numbers of species in the bark, sap 

 wood, and heart wood of the fallen trees or shrubs. In a few years 

 the branches begin to crumble because of the disorganizing effect of 

 the mycelium in the wood. Other species adapted to growing in 

 rotting wood follow and bring about, in a few years, the complete 

 disintegration of the wood. It gradually passes into the soil of the 

 forest floor, and is made available food for the living trees. How 

 often one notices that seedling trees and shrubs start more abund- 

 antly on rotting logs. 



The fallen leaves, too, are siezed upon by the mycelium of a 

 great variety of mushrooms. It is through the action of the mycelium 

 of mushrooms of every kind that the fallen forest leaves, as well as 

 the trunks and branches, are converted into food for the living trees. 

 The fungi, are, therefore, one of the most important agents in 

 providing available food for the virgin forest. 



The spawn of some fungi in the forest goes so far, in a number of 

 cases, as to completely envelop those portions of the roots of certain 

 trees as to prevent the possibility of the roots taking up food material 

 and moisture on their own account. In such cases, the oaks, beeches, 

 hornbeams, and the like, have the younger parts of their roots com- 

 pletely enveloped with a dense coat of mycelium. The mycelium 

 in these cases absorbs the moisture from the soil or forest floor and 

 conveys it over to the roots of the tree, and in this way supplies 

 them with both food and water from the decaying humus, the oak 

 being thus dependent on the mycelium. In the fields, however, 

 where there is not the abundance of humus and decaying leaves 

 present in the forest, the coating of mycelium on the roots of these 

 trees is absent, and in this latter case the young roots are provided 

 with root hairs which take up the moisture and food substances 

 from the soil in the ordinary way. 



The mushrooms also prevent the forest from becoming choked 



