Slime mold amoeba eating wild wood-rotting fungus

 This is a story about slime mold amoeba eating wild wood-rotting fungus.

 In the right side, a layer of wood-rotting fungus is attacked by the yellow amoeba of slime mold. I will explain about it from now on.

 A white wood-rotting fungus (a kind of Basidiomycetes mushroom) were growing on a dead log placed at the edge of my orchard, so I put a piece of agar sheet with yellow slime mold amoeba (Physarum rigidum) growing on the white fungus as an experiment. As you can see, slime mold is directly in touch with the white fungus.

 Actually, I have been repeating the transplanting of this slime mold about every one week for two years on the agar sheet in a shallow plastic container, giving oatmeal or fresh mushrooms as their foods.

 Two days later (June 25th), when I went to check on it, the yellow amoeba had moved to a little away place from where the agar was placed, namely to the back side of the dead log, and was starting to cover the white fungus. I think the slime mold is now digesting the fungus.

　It lasted cloudy days after that, but it started raining heavily from yesterday night (6/27). I got a little worried about the amoeba, so I went to check on it in the rain with an umbrella, and I found it had fully covered the wood-rotting fungus and was growing even more (June 28th).

 It had been raining every day, so I went to check on the slime mold again in the next morning (June 29th; 8:50am) with an umbrella. Curiously, the yellow amoeba had almost completely disappeared. The surface of the white fungus had become smooth, I think it is due to the amoeba which had digested and dissolved it.

 

 I looked around to see where the slime mold had gone, and found that it already began to eat the white fungus which was growing at the left  side of the logs.

 The slime mold has a robust appetite.

 The same phenomenon is probably happening in the forest. In this way, slime mold has an important role in the life cycle of creatures in the forest.

 As a matter of fact, I am interested in slime mold amoeba rather than their fruiting bodies. Because amoeba can move as if it had intelligence. Needless to say, fruiting bodies keep unchanged forever, though. 

 This is my orchard where I observed the slime mold. There were originally persimmon and plum trees. But I have not managed the trees and cut weeds for long time, so the orchard looks abandoned. I have placed the dead logs on a weed-proof sheet in the shade last year.

 Changing the subject, the other evening the passion flower at my house was blooming, so I took a picture. At that time, I noticed there was a shining beetle on the flower. I don't know if this is a beetle that causes a problem or not, but every year, some beetles lay eggs in the flower pots including the passion flower at my house, and their larvae eat up the roots of the plants in the soil, causing the plants to wither. This year, when I turned over the passion flower pot around March, more than 10 plump larvae came out. What a thing!

 A passion flower is a strange-shaped flower, isn’t it？ This flower is called "Tokei-so" in Japan, which means clock flower.  The name comes from the distinctive flower shape reminiscent of a clock. The divided pistils resemble the hour, minute and second hands of a clock and petals are arranged radially in a circle like a clock face.