| A
glowing mulch tale |
Greentr-@aol.com |
| Dec
19, 2003 16:07 PST |
One
day in late fall (I think it was a Wednesday) a man rushed into
my office
at the University of Guelph clutching a large cardboard box and
clearly in a
state of high excitement. This was his story:
He was up at the cottage for the weekend. His cottage lot had a
large, old,
rotting, deciduous stump that was in an inconvenient spot. It
interfered with
general activities, parking, fun and games, and was an obstacle
to general
mayhem and in particular caused serious risk to those wondering
around the lot
in the dark (or light for that matter) in various states of
inebriation.
So, he determined to rid himself, once and for all, of this
objectionable
hazard. He armed himself with a variety of tools but found a
large wood-chopping
axe was the weapon of choice. Using this axe, he attacked the
stump with
vim, vigour, general gusto, and great enthusiasm just after
lunch on Saturday.
Unfortunately, it was a much bigger job than he anticipated and
he was slow
to make an impression on this large, hardwood stump. Many
hours passed, wood
chips were flying in all directions with the vigour of his
assault. And he
was measurably running out of both enthusiasm and energy. But
he was a
stubborn man, of stout heart and perseverance (probably from
Scotland), and at
last he completed the job. By that time,
however, it was almost dark and he
was thoroughly exhausted. The wood chips by then were scattered
widely over the
yard and it was pretty messy, but 'tomorrow is another day' and
he could
clean up then.
At any rate, he dragged his weary body into the cottage, too
exhausted even
to eat supper, and fell onto his bunk in a deep slumber. When
he awoke it
was late into the night but he saw a light coming from the yard. He
we went
to the cottage window and lo and behold the yard was completely
lit up by an
intense green glow from the hundreds of wood chips scattered
around the lot.
He was amazed, awed and almost overwhelmed by this miraculous
occurrence.
The next morning (Sunday), he got a large cardboard box, filled
it with the
wood chips, put it in the trunk of his car, and drove all the
way home.
Unfortunately, he was a bit busy and couldn’t get to our
University right away.
In fact, as I mentioned earlier, it was a Wednesday by the time
he came to my
office. And it was pretty hot weather at the
time. So, his box of wood
chips had been in the trunk of his car for several hot days.
'Ah! There's the
rub'.
We took the box into the photographic darkroom, put out the
lights and opened
up the box. Now, I would like to say that the whole darkroom was
lit up by a
green spiritual glow. Sadly, not so! Absolutely NOTHING! Not
even the
faintest glimmer.
Of course this was not unexpected. Three days (more or less) in
the trunk of
a hot car had effectively cooked the hyphae into premature
demise.
Luminescence is a vital phenomenon and the dead hyphae could no
longer emit. ‘C’est
la vie’ as the say in La Belle Provence. ‘That’s
the way the cookie crumbles’
say our neighbours to the South. ‘There’s many a
slip twixt the cup and the
lip’ as my old granny in Scotland used to remind me (too
often as I recall).
The cottager was very disappointed that I couldn’t
witness his personal
miracle. And suitably chagrined at his stupidity in not bringing
the box in right
away on Monday morning. But I assured him that the long trip
down Highways 11
and 400, from north of Huntsville with the hot sun trying to
burn a hole in
his trunk, would probably be sufficient in itself to kill the
fungus and it
wouldn’t have made much difference anyway.
Note: The facts in this story are essentially
true but are slightly altered
(embellished?) for what is euphemistically called 'artistic
license' or as
Emeril would say 'to kick it up a notch'! The
fungus responsible was
Armillaria mellea.
~Anonymous |
|