Country intro
Lycogala epidendrum - looks like candy in the forest
I live in Germany and go on hikes in the forest on almost every weekend. Thanks to Jungle Dragon, I now always take my camera with me and have been thrilled with all of the interesting living things I have noticed, now that I might have a chance to add a new species. Things I had never seen before - like these charming little pink balls, that look more like sweets than slime moulds which is what they are. I remember slime moulds from my Biology class in the university - an organism that lives as separate one-celled organism until some signal (often a shortage of food) causes them to come together and act like a multicellular organism. And now I have experienced them in the wild!
Lycogala epidendrum is a cosmopolitan species of plasmodial slime mould which is often mistaken for a fungus. The aethalia, or fruiting bodies, occur either scattered or in groups on damp rotten wood, especially on large logs, from June to November.
