West Sussex<\/a>.<\/p>\nIt is only the second such specimen ever to be found in Europe. Liz Frost, an amateur fungus enthusiast who frequently visits the site, made the discovery.<\/p>\n
\u201cI still can\u2019t quite believe it,\u201d she said in a blogpost on the Natural England website.<\/p>\n
Frost had been looking for fungi in the ancient yew woodland at Kingley Vale in December when she \u201cstumbled upon something extraordinary: a tiny tongue-shaped fungus poking up through the moss and leaf litter. Little did I know, I had just made the first ever UK sighting of Microglossum cyanobasis, and only the second recorded in Europe.\u201d<\/p>\n
At about 45-55mm tall, with delicate, fragile stems, specimens of the small, well-camouflaged fungus look just like their name suggests: small tongues emerging from the earth. But Microglossum cyanobasis has a rare and special feature that distinguishes it from other, more common earthtongues: the base of the stem has a distinctive cyan-bluish tinge.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s actually where its name comes from \u2013 \u2018cyanobasis\u2019 meaning blue base,\u201d said Frost. \u201cIt\u2019s this feature that sets it apart from other earthtongues. Earthtongue fungi can act as indicators of high-quality habitats \u2026 Finding them tells us that a site has real ecological value.\u201d<\/p>\n
Natural England said the find was a reminder that careful stewardship of the environment could yield extraordinary results.<\/p>\n
Rachel Guy, the manager of the Kingley Vale nature reserve, said: \u201cThe discovery of the earthtongue fungus shows off high-quality habitats and highlights the value of our 224 national nature reserves in England.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese special places of exceptional ecological value are a credit to everyone who looks after them. The presence of the fungus signals undisturbed, nutrient-poor grasslands and long-established woodland soils. These environments are becoming increasingly rare due to fertilisation, drainage, ploughing, and land-use change.\u201d<\/p>\n
Microglossum cyanobasis was first discovered in northern Spain in 2009.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The discovery of a rare, tongue-shaped fungus is being hailed as a sign of the crucial ecological value…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":498608,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[59,57,58,50,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-498607","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-kingdom","8":"tag-gb","9":"tag-great-britain","10":"tag-greatbritain","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/498607","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=498607"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/498607\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/498608"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=498607"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=498607"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=498607"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}