Threats to our natural areas come from several sources; this problem is all too familiar in northeast Ohio. One of the goals of the Geauga County Park District is to protect high quality natural areas from rapidly encroaching development. One measure of an ecosystem's importance, as well as overall health, is in the biodiversity present. Furthermore, once the species diversity is assessed, this...

The fly agaric is a remarkable mushroom in many respects; these are its bearing, history, chemical components and the poisoning that it provokes when consumed. The 'pantherina' poisoning syndrome is characterized by central nervous system dysfunction. The main species responsible are Amanita muscaria and A. pantherina (Amanitaceae); however, some other species of the genus have been suspected f...

Alpha amanitin and phalloidin are powerful hepatotoxins that belong to the main classes of toxins namely, amatoxins and phallotoxins, isolated from the deadly poisonous mushroom Amanita phalloides. It is well known that disruptions of antioxidant enzyme defense that include superoxide dismutase (SOD), catalase, glutathione peroxidase lead to generation of reactive oxygen species, followed by in...

A special survey was undertaken to study the insects living in the sporophores of Basidiomycota in Benin, Africa. Three specimens of Chloropidae, which are described here as a new species of Gaurax Loew, were reared from two fruiting bodies of different species of fungi: Amanita subviscosa Beeli and a species of Boletaceae. The fungi were collected from Miombo woodlands in Central Benin. Fruiti...

• We looked for evidence of mycelial survival by Suillus pungens and Amanita francheti following a stand-replacing wildfire. These species were selected because we had previously mapped and genotyped their fruiting bodies in the pre-fire forest. • Mycelial survival was investigated in two ways. First, we sampled seedlings in areas where these species had fruited abundantly before the fire, and ...