Let's get together IN PERSON! Mark your calendars and REGISTER for a chance to meet and learn from author Britt Bunyard!

The meeting will be held at Mount Rainier Nature Center.

• Our President, Tom McCoy, will start us up with meeting business
• Rebecca Henderson, Director of the new Rachel Carson Museum, will give us an update about the Springsong Museum.
• In-person ID table! Bring your mushrooms (or lichens) and learn their identity from our team of identifiers!
• Culinary Chair, Cindy Connelly Ryan, and the committee will delight us with a hospitality table.
• Enjoy a riveting lecture by Britt Bunyard.

Title: Predators, Parasites, and Corpse Finders: The Secret Lives of Fungi 

Fungi are far more diverse and surprising than the familiar mushrooms we see in forests. While most fungi avoid nitrogen‑rich environments, a few thrive there: coprophilous or dung fungi are frequently found growing directly on animal waste, and launching their spores with remarkable force. Some take this a step further, having evolved to parasitize animals and even other fungi; some are predators of animals. Imagine a mushroom trapping a worm—it’s a hidden world of strategies that challenges our everyday view of mushrooms. These include a number of "zombie fungi," popular in the news of late, as well as the unusual (and less talked about) “corpse finders” and “ghoul fungi” that specialize in breaking down or attacking other organisms. Together, these examples reveal fungi as ingenious survivors, capable of exploiting niches from decaying bodies to nutrient‑rich dung, and even hunting microscopic animals—a hidden world of strategies that challenges our everyday view of mushrooms. This presentation is for general audiences with no advanced knowledge of mycology and will feature real life stories and images from Britt’s recent books.

Britt's new books: "Lives of the Fungi" and "Little Book of Fungi" will be available for purchase and autograph on-site.

Bio: Britt A. Bunyard, PhD, is the founder, Publisher, and Editor-in-Chief of the mycology journal Fungi, in print since 2008. Britt is a former university professor and has published over 100 academic and popular science papers. He has served as an editor for mycological and entomological research journals, and mushroom guide books.

A popular evangelizer on all things fungal, Britt has given more than 250 invited lectures to academic and popular audiences across North America and beyond. He has been featured on the BBC World Service’s Newshour, NPR’s All Things Considered, PBS’s NOVA and Wisconsin Foodie television programs; and interviewed or quoted in Discover magazine, The Atlantic, National Geographic, Vox, Vogue, Forbes, Saveur, Eating Well, Hobby Farm, Women’s World, and other magazines and newspapers.

Britt has collected fungi and lectured throughout North and South America, Europe, and Asia. Annually, he leads mycological expeditions throughout the world. One such expedition, was the subject of an award-winning documentary film “Look Down Not Up” (2022), produced by documentary filmmakers Alok Siddhi Tuladhar and Dusty Shiva Panthi of Kathmandu, Nepal.

Britt has authored several books, including The Lives of Fungi (2022; Princeton University Press) which is sold all over the world and translated into Italian, German, Spanish, and Chinese languages. Additional titles include Fungi of the World: A Guide to All Phyla (2026; Princeton University Press), Atlas of Fungi (2026; Princeton University Press), Fungi Decoded (2025; Penguin Random House), The Little Book of Fungi (2024; Princeton University Press), The Beginner’s Guide to Mushrooms (2021; Quarry Books), Amanitas of North America (2020; The Fungi Press), and Mushrooms and Macrofungi of Ohio and Midwestern States (2012; The Ohio State University Press). Coming in 2027: Fungi: A Practical Guide (Quarry Books).

Britt has served as Executive Director of the Telluride Mushroom Festival since 2014 and was awarded the “Dr. Emanuele Salzman Award” for service to the Telluride Mushroom Festival in 2024. In 2021 he was awarded the Gary Lincoff Award “For Contributions to Amateur Mycology,” by the North American Mycological Association—NAMA’s most prestigious honor for American mycologists.

See you all there!