7pm – doors open
7:15-30pm – presentation begins
St Luke’s Hall
Victoria – 3821 Cedar Hill X Rd, Victoria, BC
- Monthly Membership Meeting
- Live streamed/hybrid – members will receive zoom link by email
- Bring mushrooms to be identified by local experts
- Snacks, tea, socialize!
Presentation:
“Fairies and Fungi: A Festive Ecology of BC”
Kem Luther & Andy MacKinnon
It’s December, and Andy and Kem are ready to put you in the holiday spirit! Find out what makes Santa’s reindeer fly, how frost makes beards, where tipsy fairies toss their cookies, and how to escape from the fatal fairy ring.
Andy MacKinnon. Andy’s recent research interests include ecology of BC’s ectomycorrhizal fungal species. He was lead BC scientist for Environment Canada’s 2017 ranking of the province’s threatened and endangered fungal species. Andy has taught rainforest ecology field courses in Bamfield and Tofino (for the University of Victoria) and Haida Gwaii (for UBC). He has also taught mushroom identification courses in Tofino (for the Rainforest Education Society) and in Victoria. He is co-author of six best-selling books about plants of western North America and co-author of the Royal BC Museum Handbook Mushrooms of British Columbia. He is past-president of the South Vancouver Island Mycological Society (SVIMS).
Kem Luther. Kem is a naturalist and writer. He grew up in the Nebraska Sandhills, studied at Cornell, the University of Chicago, and the University of Toronto, and taught at Eastern Mennonite University, Sheridan College, York University, and the University of Toronto. When he moved from a home on Ontario’s Grand River to the southern tip of Vancouver Island in 2004, he developed an abiding passion to know the mushrooms of western North America. Besides Mushrooms of British Columbia, Kem is the author of six books, including Boundary Layer (Oregon State University Press, 2016). He has been secretary and speaker coordinator for the South Vancouver Island Mycological Society (SVIMS).
Kem and Andy, who both live in Metchosin, BC, are cofounders of the Metchosin Biodiversity Project (metchosinbiodiversity.com). They are enthusiastic participants, speakers, and field trip leaders for various mushroom festivals in southwestern BC each autumn.
