Pilobolus crystallinus (the hat thrower) Lentinula edodes (shiitake) Gymnopilus spectabilis (the waraitake) and Phytophthora infestans (cause of the Irish potato famine): four web pages by students in my Organismal Biology class at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse.

Tom Volk's Fungus of the Month for June 2007

by Ashley Seidler, Abby Hendzel, Kyle Tiefenth, Jake Benrud, and Tom Volk.

Please click TomVolkFungi.net for the rest of Tom Volk's pages on fungi

This month's fungus is actually FOUR fungi! I've been making Fungus of the Month pages for more than ten years now, and I thought it was time to spread the fun around. I taught Organismal Biology here at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse for the first time this spring semester, and I thought it would be a good idea for each student to make a web page about an organism. As you can see from the results at MultipleOrganisms.net, the students were very successful at making their own web pages. Although many of the web pages dealt with the "charismatic megafauna," four of my students chose to do their web pages on fungi. So I decided to feature those web pages here.

Some of the pages were repeats of fungi that I had already done for the fungus of the month, but I think you will agree that they are vastly different from my pages. The students got extra points for creativity and cleverness, and that clearly shows in each of these pages.

It is my intention to give this web page assignment every year, with no repeats of species that previous students have already done. If you are a teacher interested in the specifics of the assignment, please write to me and I can give you the details.

So here are the web pages! Let me know what you think!

• Pilobolus crystallinus, the hat thrower, by Ashley Seidler.
• Lentinula edodes, shiitake mushroom, by Abby Hendzel.
• Phytophthora infestans, Potato Blight, cause of the Irish Potato Famine, by Jake Benrud.
• Gymnopilus spectabilis, the Waraitake or big laughing Gym, by Kyle Tiefenth.