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Off the main trail, I encountered an amazing, alien-like oddity: the Dog’s Nose fungus (Camarops petersii or Peridoxylon petersii). Michael Kuo, who publishes MushroomExpert.com, dubbed this species “Uncle Fester’s Eyeball Fungus” in 2007.

Technically, this wet, pimply fungus is a large perithecial ascomycete, not a mushroom. It’s fruiting bodies and mycelium grow on decomposing logs (typically oak). Its blackish spores are produced just below the inky, slimy upper surface in microscopic pear-shaped structures called perithecia.

https://iowai.substack.com/p/forest-forage-for-fungi