It's mushroom season. Shelf Fungi

It's mushroom season.  Shelf Fungi 
Dr Abe V Rotor 

Shelf mushrooms are scientifically known as Polypore Fungi or polypores for their large fruiting bodies or tubes on the underside.  Framed model by the author, on display at the San Vicente (IS) Botanical Garden 2020

Monsoon is mushroom season.  Mushrooms are practically everywhere.  You don't have to go far to find one.- on the fields, limbs of trees, garbage dumps, even in damp corners of your house.  When you find one growing on old shoes, you think a fairy lives there.  Fairy tales are associated with mushroom.  It is because of the stories of the Grimm Brothers and Hans Christian Anderson, Mga Kwento ni Lola Basyang, notwithstanding.  

Mushrooms belong to Family Basidiomycetes, which together with Phycomycetes* (molds) and Fungi  imferpecti (Penicillium)**  occupy a fifth kingdom in the biological world - Mycophyta. Fungi are Nature's converter of organic compounds back to elements after the organism dies. That is why they are called decomposers.  The chemical elements are then re-assembled once again into organic compounds by plants through photosynthesis, essential for the next generation of  living things.  The cycle is repeated ad infinitum.

  

Being decomposers, fungi are the first step in food chains. Many organisms benefit from the process, - monerans (bacteria)  and protists (single-celled organisms), animals and plants.  It is a world in itself.  A world of transition, without it our world would not be what it is today.  

Fungi provide a habitat of their own, which help in the regeneration of ecosystems such as grasslands and forests, and even our own gardens. They live but briefly, emerging suddenly as a colony, then disappear. But many mushrooms live long, perhaps even for many years, often remaining incognito in their mycellial

(microscopic) stage, only to "fruit" again in the next season.   

What is probably the longest life of a shelf mushroom?  In my research I found out that a tree bracket fungus with twenty rings may be twenty years old (just like the annular rings of a tree), but it could vary depending on the seasons. There have been reports of shelf mushrooms with forty rings and weigh up to three hundred pounds. 

As long as the host plant survives, the shelf will continue to grow, so the simplest answer to how long a bracket fungus lives is — as long as the tree it infects. 

Standing dead tree serves as host to a colony of mushrooms, as well as other saprophytes, until it finally falls down and decomposes into organic matter and becomes part of the soil. Photo taken at the former Ecological Sanctuary of St Paul University QC
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While there are mushrooms which are edible and commercially produced as food, the general rule is: Don't eat those you don't know, and those you are in doubt. Do not eat any bracket fungi that have not been properly identified by a qualified professional, some are DEADLY. And remember, there is no antidote for mushroom poisoning.
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Ganoderma Tea, Ganoderma Coffee

Ganoderma lucidum.  Little is known about the safety of ganoderma. Ganoderma may cause a number of side-effects, including dizziness, stomach upset, and skin irritation. You should talk to your doctor before trying ganoderma. There have been a few case reports of people who have developed hepatitis after the use of Ganoderma lucidum products. (Internet)
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 Common edible mushrooms: Cultured Pleurotus and wild Volvariella mushroom

 *Phycomycetes has been abolished and in its place exists Zygomycetes, Chytridiomycetes, Plasmodiophoromycetes, Hyphochytridiomycetes, Trichomycetes and Oomycetes.

**Fungi  imperfecti or Deuteromycota, are fungi which do not fit into the commonly established taxonomic classifications of fungi