Myxotrichum chartarum, with its striking gymnothecia, should be better known. It is described and illustrated from cardboard in an unusual context and from culture.

The ‘Poor Man's Truffle’, ‘Truffles of the Desert’ or ‘Fagaa’ were much appreciated in earlier times, particularly by the Ancient Greeks and Romans, who imported them, largely from Carthage and Libya. They appear prominently in the writings of Theophrastus, Dioscorides and Pliny, using various names, such as hydnum, miso or misy. All fungal fruitbodies that grow underground are loosely termed ‘truffles’. The desert truffles, however, are only distantly related to the more highly prized true truffles (Tuber species), especially of southern Europe. Two genera are involved, the larger Terfezia Tul. & C. Tul., with verrucose spores, and Tirmania Chatin, with smooth spores. They are white to yellowish brown truffles, rather soft and fleshy, and can grow to quite a large size, on average around 3–10 cm across, and may weigh from 60–150 gm, although the largest recorded fruitbody (up to 1,000 gm) was produced by Tirmania nivea Desfontaines.

The long tubular branching hypha is the most important fungal growth form, although some fungi grow as discrete spherical or ellipsoidal yeast cells. Vacuoles are ubiquitous in yeast cells as well as in hyphae of filamentous fungi and can be readily stained by simple methods of dye uptake. They appear as spherical or tubular organelles of extremely variable size. Vacuoles are known or suspected to play several crucial roles in the physiology of vegetative growth. Only some of these roles are related to the activity of lytic intravacuolar enzymes. Thus, vacuoles can degrade redundant organelles, presumably recycling macromolecules, especially under conditions of nutrient starvation. They are also the destination of endocytotic vesicles originating by inward budding of the plasma membrane, thereby providing a mechanism of ‘face-lifting’ of the plasma membrane and a means of communication with the extracellular environment. Further, vacuoles store organic and inorganic nutrients, and they may detoxify the cytoplasm by sequestration of toxic substances.

Although the honey fungus (Armillaria mellea) is notorious as a common soil-borne pathogen and no woody plant appears completely immune to attack, it is frequently supposed by gardeners and others that some non-woody plants are less susceptible. Few herbaceous plants are inspected for this pathogen, and this may have limited our understanding of its epidemiology.

Phycomyces blakesleeanus is a heterothallic zygomycete, one of three species of Phycomyces, the only genus of the family Phycomycetaceae in the order Mucorales (von Arx, 1983). A well-known feature of the genus is the production of very long black sporangiophores which have a greenish metallic sheen. These are often 10 cm and may be up to 50 cm long, and are strongly phototropic. Although P. blakesleeanus is the most frequently studied species in the laboratory, it is the closely related species P. nitens (Agardh) Fr. which seems to be commonly recorded in Britain as occurring on dung, especially the droppings of rats and mice (Ingold, 1965), and other organic refuse.

Sorosphaera veronicae Schröeter has been re-discovered in Britain, forming galls on Veronica chamaedrys L. in Middlesex and Northamptonshire. A new host for this fungus, Veronica catenata Pennell, has been found on the banks of the river Thames in Surrey.

Twenty years ago a clinician could have been excused for being largely ignorant about fungi as disease causing agents. How things have changed! In the league table of serious infections in which microbes enter the bloodstream (septicaemia) and then challenge the functioning of the vital organs, the fungus Candida albicans (Robin) Berkhout has risen through the ranks of obscurity to rival some of the most common bacterial septicaemias (Calderone, 2002). It may not be appreciated that there are many more Candida infections and Candida-related deaths than there are, for example, cases of bacterial meningitis. In fact, there is a small group of Candida species that cause disease of which C. albicans is the most common and important. It is therefore right to know this yeast as fungal public enemy number one. If a doctor diagnoses a bacterial blood infection, in most cases a number of antibiotics can be used to treat the condition.