troll cat vomit

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Do you want to hear something gross but really is quite remarkable?

I often ask that question of 7-year-olds and always get a resounding, "YES!"

Imagine then if you will, a lifeform here on planet Earth that is neither plant, animal nor fungi but rather exists outside those known worlds. Yet, it is common place, found around the globe and really is quite harmless and ephemeral. It has no brain nor legs yet moves about freely and in laboratory settings can find food even navigate a maze, with remarkable efficiency.  

In its basic form it is a single amoeba-like cell that is haploid, meaning it only has half its compliment of chromosomes (like egg and sperm: Biology 101). Without a mouth, it eats bacteria and other microorganisms found on rotting logs, yet if need be, can pool its resources and join with other amoeba-like cells like itself to form a mass that works for the common good. In this form, it moves or oozes along as a mass mob.

I was so pleased to arrive home two weeks ago and find such a mass mob, collectively known as dog vomit slime mold (Fuligo septica) on a stump beside my driveway. Naturalists are thrilled by such a thing, so I was thrilled. And forgive the common name, that's the gross part. Naturalists are also thrilled by such crudeness. 

As a haploid amoeba-like cell it reproduces asexually but if it encounters a proper "mating-type" they can indeed mate and produce diploid (having a full compliment of chromosomes) zygotes. These then grow into plasmodia that contain many nuclei not divided by cellular walls that can spread to become several feet in size although the one I found was about the length of my hand. Without the proper mating-type the colony of asexually produced clones are pretty much confined to their rotten wood location.   

Yet, as Wiki relates, when and if a "sexually" produced "mass is formed, the cells reconfigure, changing their shape and function to form stalks, which produce bulbs called fruiting bodies. The fruiting bodies contain millions of spores, which get picked up and transported by the wind, a passing insect or an animal. There, they start the process again as single-celled haploid organisms. Meanwhile, the cells that formed the stalks die, sacrificing themselves."

Dog vomit slime mold is found all around the planet where there is rotting wood. In the Scandinavian countries, it is known as troll cat vomit. And in case you do not know as I did not, a troll cat is either in the shape of a cat or a ball. Troll cats suck milk from cows and spit it out into a witch's milk pail, and they sometimes go into homes to lick up cream which I do not have, but apparently, their upchuck is yellow like butter.

Thank you, Nick for introducing me to the wondrous world of slime molds.

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