It was with a heavy heart that this correspondent read yesterday (BBC report by Sarah Mukherjee) that numbers of fungi experts (mycologists) in the UK are dwindling. Within ten years, according to scientists from the Centre for Agricultural Bioscience International, in Oxfordshire, all our fungi experts will be gone, never to be replaced.

The news has also reached the ears of Steve Connor at the Independent and was deemed so important to Sarah Mukherjee at the BBC that she wrote two stories about it.

Mushroomers have an amazing job. I honestly have no idea why young people wouldn’t be inspired to research fungi. New species are still being discovered, and you can make very funny jokes. Like calling yourself a “fungi to be with”.

For a rather bizarre round up of why fungi are important check out this article from the BBC.

Nature News reported on an historical line of fungi experts, beginning with Edward Gange, the fungal recorder for the Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Society, whose son is also a fungus expert – see this news story from last year, and John Whitfield’s take on his own story. Let’s hope that the UK’s expertise in fungi is not reliant only on the Gange family in future.

Image of the fly agaric fungus: Wellcome library, London