sowbugs in the mint

I watered the Corsican mint, and sowbugs boiled out. Approx. one grown-up sowbug, four adolescents, and seven little ones.

Zygomycetous sporangiophores r00l

Alexopoulos, Mims, and Blackwell's Introductory Mycology has introduced me to my new houseplant:

[Phycomyces blakesleeanus] produces two types of sporangiophores that, because of significant differences in their sizes, have been designated microphores and macrophores. [...] Macrophores, on the other hand, are large, spectacular, metallic-appearing structures that often reach lengths of between 100 and 500 mm. [...] The macrophores respond to a variety of different types of stimuli, including light and gravity, and exhibit an avoidance response for almost any obstacle they encounter during elongation. [...] As noted by Corrochano and Cerdá-Olmeda (1992), while many plants and fungi can detect full moonlight, the human eye and Phycomyces can "see" stars.

Also,

Pilobolus has a growth requirement for dung extract or hemin [...], and it is unique in the order Mucorales in being able to discharge its sporangium forcibly for a distance of up to 2 m or more. [...] In Pilobolus the mature sporangiophores bends towards light, apparently as a result of the subsporangial vesicle acting as a lens to focus transmitted light to a spot below the vesicle [...]. The subsporangial vesicle has a high turgor pressure, and when it eventually ruptures, it ejects the sporangium toward the source of light [...]. The sporangium adheres to the surface it contacts. On a wet surface the calcium oxalate crystals on the sporangium wall create an unwetted surface that causes it to rotate. The mucilaginous material around the spores then glues the sporangium to the contacted surface [...]. The next round of the life cycle is successful when the sporangium is ingested by a herbivore.

Don't go away, there's more!

Additionally, parasitic nematodes use Pilobolus for their own devices. While nematodes of several species may crawl up to the sporangium, only larvae of the cattle lungworm, Dictyocaulus vivipores [sic], are in the proper stage of their life cycle to survive propulsion through the air on the sporangium to await ingestion by a new host [...].