ellietrombone's Journal

General Obs: Raining on and off the past few days, the slime mold was in a drier hillside under some trees but the stick I found it on was fairly damp. Between the first obs. and the second obs. there was a break in the rain for about 2-3 hours.
This is just to document how fast a slime mold can change. The first observation shows the plasmodium beginning to form the fruiting body, you can see the 'veins' leading to the sacs. When I touched them they were like yogurt, oozing together and not holding their form. Originally they were bright yellow, and had no true 'stalks'.
The second observation is from only 3 or so hours later, it had completely changed! My camera couldn't quite pick this up, but it was bright orange (near Cheeto color) and had formed sacs with a white 'stalk'. Now when I picked them they were hard, nothing like my first observation, and if I squeezed them they would pop and yellow plasmodium would ooze out.

It's just amazing how fast a a slime mold can react to changes in its environment, the friends I dragged to look at the slime mold with me were shocked. It also vindicates my decision when I observe a slime mold to observe it daily/as often as I can, things change fast!

I know the human mind likes to make connections, but the past month I've seen more dead/dying Carabus Nemoralis on this single street than I have the 5 years I've lived in Bellingham. Maybe it's just luck and confirmation bias, or it's the end of their life cycle, or there could be some sort of habitat or nest that just so happens to be there? I just think it's interesting that it's happened three times in a (relatively) short amount of time.