However, rather than using a stomach to accomplish digestion, fungi live in or on their own food supply and simply spread into new food as the local environment becomes nutrient depleted. Many plants, from orchids to pine trees, will not grow without a fungal partner forming an intimate association of its mycelium with the roots of the plant. This is called a mycorrhizal association. Kew Many fungi have great potential as biological controls for insects, weeds, eel-worms, and plant pathogens and eventually may be used to reduce the use of toxic pesticides that cause environmental pollution. At Kew and elsewhere research is being done to utilise this potential.
Fungi are remarkable organisms present in every type of habitat and ecosystem throughout the world.
Vital work is being done by the Mycology Section at Kew to shed new light on these unknown species. There is no doubt that fungi are of immense ecological and scientific importance, yet there is still much to learn about them. Two sets of illustrated fungi information sheets are available, especially for naturalists and everyone interested in finding out more about fungi. Each set contains 10 A4 loose-leaf illustrated sheets in a neat card file. These have proved to be one of our most popular items at exhibitions and displays.