Nazar Fungus, Nazar Star Anemone Has Anemonfish Friends, and Meditation 2.5 x 3.5 inches; ballpoint pen (except for Meditation, which was done in acrylic)
Some original off-the-cuff pieces I managed to get done this year. Life is hard.
Postage stamp tattoo designs for a mail art friend!! First one features bog beacon mushrooms, second is the bog copper, a butterfly that only lives in cranberry bogs!
Pick was the theme for today’s Inktober. When we are in the open, sometimes we find ourselves imagining being surrounded by fantastic creatures, so we immediately thought about this scene with this little one!
Building Soil Health for Healthy Plants by soil scientist Dr. Elaine Ingham
“A revolution in our understanding of soil has been taking place.
“Conventional” agriculture requires ever-increasing inputs and energy into the system to maintain production, while natural systems reduce the disturbances in the system, while increasing production.
Historically, soil science ignored or dismissed soil life as important, in large part because the methods used to study organisms in soil were mis-leading, inaccurate and missed about 99% or more of the species present in soil.
With the advent of microscope methods and genetic assessment of soil life, we are beginning to unravel the mysteries of the soil. A framework to help growers easily understand the differing specific sets of beneficial organisms required for healthy growth of different types of plants will be presented.
Understanding soil life is critical if we want to be sustainable; we need to work with nature, instead of waging war on natural laws as we do in our agricultural systems, to the detriment of people and the planet.
View the slides from this presentation at permaculturevoices.com/96 “
Researchers at Binghamton and Rutgers Universities, USA, have developed a self-healing fungi concrete mix that could help solve the issue of crumbling infrastructure – caused by cracks in the structure’s concrete. The team received support from the Research Foundation for the State University of New York’s Sustainable Community Transdisciplinary Area of Excellence Program.
Assistant Professor Congrui Jin, Binghamton University, commented, ‘Without proper treatment, cracks tend to progress further and eventually require costly repair […] If micro-cracks expand and reach the steel reinforcement, not only the concrete will be attacked, but also the reinforcement will be corroded, as it is exposed to water, oxygen, possibly CO2 and chlorides, leading to structural failure.’
The team found that mixing Trichoderma reesei – a fungus – with the concrete could solve this issue. The fungus lies dormant in the mix until water and oxygen reach it through cracks in the concrete.
‘With enough water and oxygen, the dormant fungal spores will germinate, grow and precipitate calcium carbonate to heal the cracks,’ commented Jin. ‘When the cracks are completely filled and ultimately no more water or oxygen can enter inside, the fungi will again form spores. As the environmental conditions become favorable in later stages, the spores could be wakened again.’
Further research is needed to ensure the fungus can survive in the concrete mix.
To find out more on materials science, packaging and engineering news, visit our website IOM3 at or follow us on Twitter @MaterialsWorld for regular news updates.
I have been having a really blah day, and so I needed a colorful lichen to brighten my mood. I am not sure it gets any brighter than L. silacea! This crustose lichen has a thick thallus of bright rusty-red or orange. It is cracked and tile-like, with black apothecia dotting the surface. It grows on acidic rock in arctic-alpine habitats in Europe, Greenland, and North America. Never let a bad day go by without reminding yourself that the world is full of adorable little lichens that look like squishy little piles of clay but are actually very hard and durable and will most likely outlast you on this godforsaken world. Where was I going with this? Oh yeah, isn’t L. silacea so cute???
Um … anyone else having trouble uploading/editing multiple-picture-posts? Is this a my dumb internet thing? Or a new post-version thing? Ugh, annoying. I will try not to let it get me down and color my opinion of today’s lichen, M. polyphaea. This crustose lichen has a thin, wrinkled, gray-green thallus with black-disked apothecia. The surface is often coated in a thin layer of powdery pruina. M. polyphaea grows closely attached to smooth tree bark in the SW U.S. Pretty sure. There are records of it growing elsewhere, but the description I am reading is pretty specific about that range. IDK, a lot of things aren’t making sense to me today. But you know what does make sense? Falling in love with little dudes like this.
I have been really thinking I need a haircut lately. I can’t pull off the long-haired, brunette look like N. abbreviata. This brittle, fruticose lichen grows on conifers in chaparral and coast-adjacent woodland. It has a reddish-brown, fruticose thallus, and flat, concolorous apothecia surrounded in a ciliate margin. Nododobryoria was only recognized as a sperate genus from Bryoria lichens in 1995 due to a difference in chemical composition and cellular structure. Goes to show you shouldn’t judge a lichen by its thallus–it’s what’s on the inside that counts!
