iNaturist Workshop, Sunday, March 8, 2020

SVIMS iNaturalist Workshop

Help document biodiversity in BC’s parks with the BC Parks iNaturalist Project

Date: Sunday March 8th, 2020

Time: 3:15pm – 5:30 pm

Place: Swan Lake Nature House

Cost: by donation

iNaturalist is used worldwide to crowdsource and share biodiversity observations: users take photos of flora, fauna, and fungi using their mobile phones or cameras and upload those images to inaturalist.ca, and iNaturalist’s image recognition software and user community can help identify the organism. Kelly Fretwell and Naomi Salie from the BC Parks Foundation will guide you through the process of using iNaturalist to make great citizen science observations of the fascinating fungi, lichens, and slime moulds you come across while out exploring, and to share your own species identification expertise.

Learn about how SVIMS members can get involved in citizen science through the BC Parks iNaturalist Project. This project now has more than 116,000 observations of 5,000 species, thanks to the photo and identification contributions of over 2,700 citizen scientists. By contributing to this project you can create an interactive record of your outdoor explorations while also generating data that helps researchers develop a deeper understanding of what our parks are protecting.

Those with expertise can also share their knowledge and help others identify what they found: the skills and knowledge of SVIMS members would be particularly valuable in determining the often more elusive identities of fungi, lichens, and slime moulds found by other observers.

The afternoon will include a guided stroll in Swan Lake Nature Sanctuary to find and photograph species, so be sure to bring a smart phone or camera to take photos.

Recommendations & optional equipment to prepare for this event:

  • Create an iNaturalist account at inaturalist.ca
  • Download the iNaturalist app on your mobile phone.
  • Bring a laptop computer if you would prefer to use iNaturalist’s desktop website platform rather than the app (not required, but you might find it helpful)
  • Bring a hand lens (loupe) to learn how to turn your phone into a handheld macro lens

Foray on February 8, 2020

On Saturday, February 8, 2020, Andy MacKinnon led a SVIMS foray to Metchosin Wilderness Park.

About 20 SVIMS members attended.

After many days of rain, the weather cooperated. We had sunshine the whole morning. 

Several of the foray participants found late-blooming Hedgehog mushrooms (Hydnum umbilicatum).  Bill Weir knew where to find them!

Participants found 32 different mushrooms. Some of them are pictured in the group shot (above or at the left).

The species list can be viewed here. It’s on iNaturalist–we welcome any help in getting more accurate identifications.

Highlights included a brilliant yellow Chrysomphalina grossula, an unusual find. Finding Mycena sanguinolenta on a cone was also unusual. The Earthtongues (Geoglossum umbratile) attracted considerable interest, as did the black cup fungus Pseudoplectania melaena (which iNaturalist insists on calling Plectania melaena). Andy could barely contain his excitement at seeing Phlebia tremellosa (called Merulius tremellosus on iNaturalist) on a standing dead red alder.

New Mycophile

SVIMS is a member of The North American Mycological Association (NAMA), the collective that unites the mycological societies on this continent.  Six times a year NAMA publishes its newsletter, the Mycophile, and makes it available to members of all supporting clubs.  The January/February 2020 issue was recently released.  To read it, click on the picture of the cover. 

Joey Tanney talk on Endophytes — SVIMS, Feb 6, 2020

We’ve all got ’em.  Endophytes.

They’re the silent partners of all life, the bacteria and fungi that live quietly between (and sometimes inside) the cell walls of plants, animals, and other fungi. 

Come to the SVIMS meeting on Thursday, February 6, and hear the Pacific Forestry Centre’s own Joey Tanney spill the beans on the secret world of endophytic fungi.

Rhytisma punctatum, tarspot fungus, an endophyte living within the leaf of a Bigleaf Maple

SVIMS Mushroom Chinese Dinner

Event Date: March 21, 2020

March 21, 2020

6 pm to about 8 pm
Shanghai City Restaurant, 548 Fisgard St, Victoria

 

The suggested dinner menu is as follows:

– Dehydrated “Tea Mushroom” with pork rib double-boiled soup
– Lotus leaf steamed chicken with Cordyceps blossoms
– Stir-fried rib eye steak with fried garlic
– Shredded pork and shiitake mushroom chow mein
– Assorted mushrooms on Chinese greens
– Sliced King Oyster Mushroom with Celery
– Enoki mushrooms with Silken Egg tofu and broccoli
– Garlic jumbo prawns with Glutinous Sticky Rice

Fortune Cookies, Tea and Steamed Rice

$38 all-inclusive of food, tax and tip

This event is open to all SVIMS members and their friends.
We have to give the exact number of participants to the Shanghai City
Restaurant shortly after the SVIMS March 5 meeting, and you have to pay in
advance. Register early, we cannot have more than 50 to 55 guests! Tell us
about your dietary restrictions in advance; we will have to ask the restaurant if they would be able to find any substitutes for you.

How to pay:
Payment can be made by cheque or cash at the SVIMS February or March meetings
(ensure “Pay to” is “South Vancouver Island Mycological Society”),
or by e-transfer sent to svims.treasurer@gmail.com using password “svims” (if
your financial institution requires six characters use “svims1”).
Payments to be received no later than Monday, March 10. (NOTE: Payments are not
refundable after the March 10 cut-off date!)

Note: Please, keep in mind the change of the place.

The menu was suggested by Mrs. Vicky Low, the original Golden City owner and the meals will be prepared by the same chef who made many of our mushroom meals in Golden City and also the last ones in Don Mee. On January 1st, this “our” chef moved to the Shanghai City Restaurant, and we are following him there.

If you have any comments or questions, send them to me at
aceska@telus.net .

All the best luck in the Chinese New Year!

Adolf Ceska