Educational information for little visitors (preschoolers and schoolchildren) and their parents visiting the fungarium’s museum and Mushroom Club meetings.

К нам в Фунгарий в последнее время приходят совсем маленькие посетители, которые уже интересуются грибами! Чтобы правильно ответить на вопросы этих почемучек нужны специальные книжки, фильмы, игры. На этой странице начну собирать такого рода материал, чтобы он был под рукой.

Рисовать любят почти все дети. А раскрашивание доступно даже самым маленьким. У нас в библиотеке есть замечательная раскраска, текст к которой (на английском) написан известным микологов David Arora — Mushrooms of the world with pictures to color (под названием книги ссылка для скачивания электронной копии). Книжку в бумажном виде можно купить на Амазоне.

Из мультфильмов про грибы могу посоветовать замечательный японский сериал — аниме «Сельскохозяйственные истории — Moyashimon» (под названием ссылка на видео на yandex.ru/video). Страница в Википедии об этом сериале: https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moyashimon.

Большой методический материал для школьного образования в области микологии собран на сайте Британского микологического общества «FUNGI4SCHOOL» и в разделе «Education and Outreach«. Опираясь на эти материалы мы готовим игры и занятия для детской аудитории на фестивалях грибов в музее Природы и Человека.

Из нашей русской литературы о грибах — детям:

• Хорошо известен автор — миколог Московского университета Лидия Г. Гарибова. Ее книжки для детей могут стать хорошим введением в науку о грибах (например, Царство грибов — книга для чтения детям)
• Известный рассказ В. Сутеева «Под грибом» понравится самым маленьким, и к нему у нас в музее есть  приложение — большой пазл с картинкой истории
• Книжка Алены Васнецовой «Грибное Царство» (художник Ольга Громова) — замечательное популярное издание для младших школьников
• Перевод шведской книжки «Софи в мире грибов» (Стефан Каста), выпущенный издательством Белая Ворона в 2017 году. Удивительные иллюстрации грибов в этой книге выполнены известным Шведским ботаническим художником Bo Mossberg, который работал над иллюстрациями многих научных изданий (флор, определителей).
• И наконец настоящий курс Введения в микологию в форме фэнтези или детского детектива в книге Путешествие в царство Базидии (автор — Миколог из Новосибирска, Никитина Светлана Михайловна), этой книгой зачитываются даже взрослые! На странице Наука в Сибири см. интервью с автором книги.

А вот например фильмы уже для более старших школьников, в целом о царстве грибов и их связи с нашей жизнью:

Last update: 25.02.2018

Клуб Гриболюбов Югры (КГЮ) – объединение по интересам. Собирает любителей и ученых микологов вокруг темы: грибы в Югре. Заседания клуба могут проводиться 3-4 раза в год. Клуб поддерживает проведение микологических исследований в Югре, участвует в осеннем Фестивале грибов, организует просветительские мероприятия.

A set of new books in our Mycolibrary from Autumn-Winter 2017:

• The last issues of a wonderful popular journal of Saint-Petersburg mycological society «The planet of Fungi»
• Several monographs and proceedings on biodiversity of Komi republic acquired during the conference there
• A tutorial on methods of laboratory work with microfungi from the department of Mycology and Algology of MSU
• Several lovely small books with mushroom recipes for the Fungarium’s museum shelf
• And a rare edition on mushroom dyes written by Finnish enthusiasts Carla and Erik Sundstrom together with Miriam Rice.

Welcome to read and enjoy!

In close proximity to Yugra region, Komi republic is located in European part of Russia closer to the Center and probably due to historical reasons, scientific history is longer and institutions (at least in biology) are quite well developing there. There is a center of this research in the Institute of Biology of Komi with many research directions from biodiversity, vegetation science to Geoinformatics and Climatology. The network of Nature protected areas is also well developed and includes about 13% of the region’s total area.

The research interests of the institute increasingly concern high latitudes, e.g. arctic ecosystems and the majority of reports were about this zone. As i had only shortly visited this zone before (mainly near polar circle and not far north), i have become inspired now by special nature and diverse research work there. It was possible to listen to all sections of the conference, so that the reports about vegetation, floras, cryptogamic plants, algae, protists, fish, birds, soils and many other were following one after other, showing different aspects of biology at Far North.

Also two round tables with short reports and vital discussions finished the program of two days: about vegetation classification + mapping and about climate changes. I remember enjoying these disputes as they were informal and of current interest of the gathered audience. And dances and songs finished the program of the third day, very nice:).

I met several mycologists and lichenologists working in Syktyvkar, and hope that our friendship will help study our neighbor regions in more detail in future. Many thanks to the organizers and all other colleagues for very interesting meeting and communication! Hope to visit Syktyvkar soon again!)

The Biological State Museum of K.A. Timiryazev hosts a large exposition dedicated to mycology and fungi, including large collection of neatly made models of mushrooms (http://www.gbmt.ru/ru/display/4.php).

I visited the exhibition today, on the way back from Syktyvkar to Khanty-Mansiysk.

The mushroom models there were made by an artist A.F. Manaev, and there are about 100 species of agarics, bolete, discomycetes, clavarioid, gasteroid fungi, e.g. different systematical groups are well showed. The main exposition showing diversity and ecology (habitats) of larger fungi, but there are also models of poisonous species and their edible similarities. And posters show fungal development and phytopathology.

Komi Republics borders Yugra from the West, the border lies through the mountain range of Northern Ural and two regions have many historical connections and geographical similarities. Going to see many more about the region with my eyes soon, participating in a conference on «Biodiversity of ecosystems of the Far North: inventory, monitoring, conservation». The program includes broad spectrum of presentations discussed in five sections: about vegetation; floras (including fungi) and faunas, conservation and soil science of Northern Regions. Plus three round tables on important issues of vegetation classification, global climate changes and education in Northern Biodiversity science.

More about the conference (and electronic theses) here: https://ib.komisc.ru/add/conf/tundra

We have recently finished our annual work on historical review of mycological studies in Yugra + publication of Fungal Records Database of Yugra in GBIF and thus, it will be the topic of my presentation. It will include introduction on importance of biodiversity data bases, their standards and present global repositories. The history of research of fungi in Yugra will go then: a mushroom-shaped cloud of words should revive the story :). And our steps of creating a regional database + making it available to the broad community through GBIF will be in conclusion.

The presentation with the report (pdf, in Russian).

The conference’ symbol is the Northern most delicious berry — Cloudberry (Rubus chamaemorus); also tastes nice for fungi as at least 21 species are growing as saprotrophs on its litter. Including very beautiful Rutstroemia chamaemori, Hyaloschypha fuscostipitata and others. Northern biodiversity is really undiscovered and flourishes secretly in our regions :).

Tried to make connection between the traditional crafts and biodiversity studies today, at the International congress of Traditional art and culture in Khanty-Mansiysk, the section on Methods and technologies of reconstruction of the archaeological and ethnographic heritage.

The cause of building such a distant bridge was our interest in fungal dyes and how they could be used by artists and craftsmans in the region. The presentation seems to sparked interest in the audience (few have ever heard about this technology before). I promised our help in ID and any related studies of dyeing species, so hope that there could be some collaborative work in the future. And i was also amazed by how many craft technologies are studied and developed in our region, like weaving, pottery, jewelry, making traditional clothes, rugs and many others.

Our presentation with the report (Pdf) (The benefits of biodiversity studies for the revival of traditional crafts: obtaining natural dyes from mushrooms in Yugra) (in Russian).

Link to the Congress Program.

This bark could look abandoned and clean, but if one will take its samples, cultivate them in wet chambers and then learn one-selves to be a specialist in Corticolous Myxomycetes, this would make a difference. As there is a whole community of these tiny creatures, currently in dormant stage but will thrive in wet warm conditions of a chamber. The tree species, size and age matters; as well as vegetation type, bark exposition, and height — all forming different composition of myxo-communities.

Thus, i am involved in an inventory of Corticolous Myxomycetes in our location. A specialist in this group from Novosibirsk botanical garden asked my help as a samples collector; which means wandering through forests from tree to tree with an ax .. gently scratching some pieces of the tree’s bark.

Also wrote a formula of such collaborative work borrowing Remote Access term from INTERACT language (https://fungariumysu.org/remote-access/).

An album where all photos of sampling in the field collected:

The last time i published our Mycological Library update was last spring and after half of year we have some new comers. Not many, but interesting and specific books.

Four Conference Proceedings are here from meetings in Moscow, Zvenigorod and in Irkuts.

An excellent guide on plant-pathogenic fungi for students, describing mycobiota of this important group nearby Zvenigorod field station of MSU, by Ekaterina Blagoveschenskaya.

An excellent summary of Polypore fungi inventory made by a collective of mycologists during a workshop in Central Forest reserve (with a simple key for this group, was already helpful to me in the field!).

And lastly, two sources about Fungal Dyes by Miriam Rice: a CD and a book about dyeing, making paper from polypores and making paints from mushrooms.
The library is opened to all curious!

+ one extra for the smallest ones 🙂

The community of botanists of Russia is going to meet soon in Irkutsk, East Siberia, at the bank of beautiful Baykal lake and at the foothills of East Sayan mountains for a regular conference «Problems of studying and preserving the plant world of Eurasia» (http://conf.sifibr.irk.ru/eng.html). The conference is dedicated to a bryologist, a specialist in floristics and biogeography of East Siberia Bardunov Leonid Vladimirovich. A genus of green moss named Bardunovia is related to this researcher.

Probably too beautiful place for a scientific conference.. as it would be difficult to concentrate on work:) Anyhow, there are 7 sections including one dedicated to Cryptogamic biota, e.g. mosses, fungi and algae.

My presentation will be about fruiting dynamics and community structure of macromycetes of the oligotrophic bog. I will relate the study of vegetation (plant communities) and fungal communities and discuss the differences and general methods used to describe community structure and composition when studying macrofungi. And show our results of community structure and dynamics revealed during four (actually 3,5) years of plot-observations. This time period allowed to reveal some unvariable characteristics of composition and quantitative structure, but also the seasonal and inter annual dynamics of number of species, total productivity and abundance.

The presentation with the text is available in pdf (in Russian).

Another reason to visit Irkutsk is to become acquainted with my 3-week Tardigrade-looking niece. My sister was studying water bears there and her baby looks like them, what a coincidence! 🙂