3:00 snapshot #1331, organisms at work

[urbpan]

Summer is awesome because even if you are working hard at your job at the zoo (I promise) you can find new and interesting living things everywhere you look! Here's yet another Amanita mushroom!




Because I'm known as "the mushroom guy" (as well as "the bug guy"--I've got it pretty good), I was called over to look at "some weird fungus" in the Aussie Aviary.


That was no fungus, that was the sporangia of the slime mold Stemonitis axifera, the chocolate tube slime.


There's a ton of Monotrope (ghost flower) coming up all over the zoo, indicating that there's a lot of mycorrhizzae for it to parasitize.


This isn't random wildlife, it's a collection animal--a buckeye, in the Butterfly Pavilion.


Here's our carousel--no organisms here, right? Oh wait, is the horse on top of that central pole a stallion or a gelding?


Oh lookie there, a hornet's nest. 35 feet up, at the center of a 40 foot diameter carousel. I took care of it this morning. Any guesses as to how I did it?