The Accidental Fungusarium

No, it's not a band you've never heard of so you can pull your knickers from your clenched bum cheeks. Inspired by a by a post on bOINGbOING a few months back, I made a mossarium. I thought it would be a lovely addition to the crib. And it was. For about a week. Then something started to happen.

I woke up one morning and there were what appeared to be spider webs running across the bottom. I turned to the trusty Internets to find that this was not at all uncommon and, depending on which random know-it-all you believed, it was one kind of fungus or another and I could easily remedy the situation by opening the lid and letting it dry out.

But since I'm all about science, I thought I'd just let nature take it's course and enjoy the mysteries of fungi. Sure enough the webs began to spread and soon there were little spores all over the sides of the bowl.

Then, something strange happened. From out of nowhere, little flies appeared inside. I had a lid on it, so I don't know how they would have gotten inside. I'm quite content to believe it was an isolated case of insta-genesis. Maybe one night, as I was sleeping, they just popped into existence, not unlike the spider webs or a mini-micro-scale big bang.

Anyway, a few weeks ago, my son and I caught some pollywogs at Griffith Park. They've been in a little aquarium for a while, but today, one of them looked more toad than pollywog, so I decided it was time to empty the Fungusarium and turn it back into a terrarium so the little toads can have a little slice of heaven before we release them back into Nature's maw. But before I did, I took some photos of my uninvited guests.

Before you ask, no, it didn't stink. It smelled like the woods after a rain. Like the song says, "Everything is beautiful in its own way."