#lichen answers

[lichenaday]

hey you said that you study lichen, does that include growing them? my mum keeps trying to grow lichen off fallen branches and they just die. does anyone know how to grow them?

So my lab is one of many lichen lab groups trying to grow lichens and like, no, you really can't. Even with our super specialized equipment and knowledge and light and climate and humidity controls, we can only grow lichens for a short amount of time. Lichens function on a completely different time-scale than a lot of other organisms. They grow very slowly, and so adapt pretty precisely to where they are. And if something in their environment changes or they move to a new location, their first response is to go into a dormant state and wait for conditions to improve, and if possible, slowly adapt to these new conditions outside the scale of human observation. I am talking like, decades of slow progress. We also think that the microorganisms associated with lichens might play a more key role in their growth than we are aware of, but that is just a theory. Don't quote me on that. We still aren't entirely sure. Lots of folks are trying to figure this out in light of climate change and expanding habitat degradation--both to better understand lichen adaptability and ecophysiological responses to this rapidly changing world, and to house and cultivate endangered species before we lose them in nature.

Also as a side note, there's a cafe in my town that has a "moss wall" that is just Cladonia lichen dyed green (the kind you often find in craft stores). The waiter there was like "It's living! We spray it every day so it stays healthy!" and I was just like . . . girl ok whatever.

[jbbartram-illu]

Would you be open to sharing your lichen tattoo? That sounds awesome!

Totally!! I love showing it off & as a bonus (?) I'll also throw in my latest tattoo (from february), a hand-poked Lascaux horse (I plan to add two more so I have a small bicep-herd)!

Lichen:

& Lascaux-horse (the closeup was from right after it was done, so it's a little angry-looking...I still need a proper fully-healed photo, but the awkward, look ma, same horse! snapshot is all I have for now)

[theminecraftbee]

Idk if you were watching Joe's craft stream today, but he and wels were talking about hermit DND again! If it actually happens imma go insane about it

i have actually been watching iskall but i've heard they were talking about it and GOD I HOPE IT HAPPENS... i think it would be VERY FUN IF IT DID.......

[thunderworks]

slides in to ask about your au again

uhhh what are the flowers/lycanthropy like (if you've got a concept for them wjeelkzsedldf)

same for barracuda-

random fun facts about beetle if you've got any perchance,,

HAYLO 💥

Lichen: a little gremlin of a creature. Did not exist before game events. Beetle made him on accident while messing with the Tree shard’s powers. Something of a cricket-puppy.

Notes on the page

feral little beast of a man

born pink from a corrupted triangle as Beetle was messing with his power

neck spikes

jumping legs (cricket?)

spike tail looks like a bunny 😔

(I’m actually not too opposed to the tail now, I think it’s cute. That was the main homage to the original flowers in the game)

Flowers: TBD

Barracuda: TBD

random fun facts about Beetle 🪲

Actually a very good cook, he just doesn’t feel like making anything complicated unless guests come over

Will make things when Bloc comes over

Still has a soft spot for taking care of plants, now that he’s no longer a farmer. Maintains a tiny garden outside of the cave

Bloc brought him seeds of more variety

Remains living in the cave after game events, it’s one of the only existing structures large enough for him to live in. A group effort makes it substantially more cozy (including a giant quilt made by many grandmas)

Heli is initially extremely apprehensive of him. They’re concerned about Bloc going to visit, not wanting her to get sick. Warms up to Beetle once she sees how gentle he is in-person

Kindof scared of Cyan both before & after game events

Mentor figure to Citrine (Circle), sees himself in them

Favorite pie is lemon pie

Im contemplating a Pikuniku crossover. Two pink “monsters” who live in a cave & like to take care of plants

[transmasc-wizard]

nanowrimo day one opening paragraph woo

[bugintheruins]

to add on to last ask i mean smthn like the 2's reactions or like .......... interior design choices, tea time

MEANT TO ANSWER AGES AGO heres some teatime while discussing music :]

and heres some more doodles :'D

[firelightfoxes]

your picture of Lichen was just so charming and given my username I felt I just HAD to draw her :D enjoy!

omg... i don't even have the words for how this makes me feel!!! i love it so much, i love the colors and you captured her expression perfectly. when i saw that you followed i was like hell yeah, target audience REACHED. thank you so much for this!!!

[headspace-hotel]

Oh my god I'm sooooo mad right now

So. I have no business telling people not to collect wild plants/materials.

I do it all the time.

However.

The words "wildcrafted," and "foraged," even "sustainably harvested," are terrifying to see in an ad on Etsy or Instagram

There is a such thing as the honorable harvest where you ASK the plant if it is okay to take, with the intention of listening if the answer is NO. Robin Wall Kimmerer talked about this, She did not make it up, it is an ancient and basic guideline of treating the plants with respect.

Basically it is not wrong to use plants and other living things, even if this means taking their life. But you are not the main character. You have to reflect on your knowledge of the organism's life cycle and its role in the ecosystem, so you can know you are not damaging the ecosystem. You have to only take what you need and avoid depleting the population.

Mary Siisip Geniusz also talked about it in an enlightening way in her book Plants Have So Much to Give Us, All We Have To Do is Ask. She gave an example of a woman who was on an island and needed to use a medicinal herb to heal her injured leg or she would not survive the winter. In that situation she had to use up all of the plant that was on the island. This was permissible, even though it eliminated the local population, because she had to do it to save her life. But in return the woman had the responsibility to later return to the island and plant seeds of that plant.

And what makes me absolutely furious, is that there are a bunch of people online who have vaguely copied this philosophy of sustainability in a false and insulting way, saying "wildcrafted" or "foraged" materials to be all trendy and cool and in touch with nature, when it is actually just poaching.

If you are from a capitalistic culture the honorable harvest is very hard and unintuitive to learn to practice. I am not very good at it still. This is why it is suspicious if someone is confident that they can ethically and respectfully harvest wild materials with money involved.

So there's this lichen that is often called "reindeer moss." It looks like this:

It grows only a few millimeters a year.

This is "preserved" reindeer moss.

It is from Etsy, similar is also sold in many other online shops, many of which have the audacity to describe it as a "plant" for decorations and terrariums that needs no maintenance.

It is not maintenance-free, it is dead. It has been spray-painted a horrible shade of green. The people buying it clearly don't even know what it is. It is a popular crafting material for "fairy houses," whatever the hell those are. So is moss, also dead, spray-painted, and wild-harvested. Supposedly reindeer moss is harvested sustainably in Finland, where it is abundant, for the craft industry. However poaching of lichens and mosses is absolutely rampant.

It's even more upsetting because there's hardly any articles drawing attention to the problem. This one is from 1999. And the poaching is still going on.

There is a "moss" section on Etsy, and it is so upsetting

These mosses and lichens were collected from the wild. Most of the shops are in the Pacific Northwest or Appalachia, which are the major locations of moss and lichen poaching. There are some shops based in Appalachia selling "foraged" reindeer moss.

Reindeer moss may be abundant in Finland, but in Appalachia it should NOT be harvested to be sold on Etsy as craft supplies! Moss doesn't grow quickly. Big, healthy colonies like this took years to grow. Some of these shops have thousands of sales, all of bags and bags of moss and lichen, and thinking of how much moss and lichen that must be, I am filled with horror.

Clubmosses do not transplant well, and these ones have no roots. The buyers do not realize they have bought a dead plant because clubmoss stays green and pliable after it is dead.

This is especially awful because in Mary Siisip Geniusz's book she talked about clubmosses being poached so much for Christmas wreaths that they had almost disappeared from a lot of forests.

I don't even know if this is illegal if it's not a formally endangered species so I don't know if I can report them I'm just. really sad and angry

[balthazarslostlibrary]

Do you prefer lichen composed of algae or cyanobacteria?

An extremely good question.

I enjoy both, however my favourite genus of lichen is the Cladonia genus, in which I am including both the Cladonia and Cladina morphotypes, which are lichens that primarily associate with algae. I love their little cups and horns, and some are quite beautiful. Related lichen such as Pulchrocladia sp. are also very very pretty and make me think of lacy dresses. I would love to see an outfit based off of P retipora.

Here are some photos I have of Cladonia sp.

Cladonia sp. Cladonia morphotype. Note the singularly attached, un-branched cups and horns, growing from small wart like deposits on the ground.

Cladonia sp. Cladina morphotype. Highly branched with much thinner cups and horns. More moss-like.

Pulchrocladia rangifera, not in the Cladonia genus, in the same family. Possibly one of the prettiest lichens I have seen.

I do love cyanobacteria associated lichens such as the dog lichens found in the genus Peltigera, purely because they have such striking dark blue colourations, almost to the point of being black. See below a dog lichen I found as part of a trip collecting herbarium samples.

Fun fact, in the process of digging this lichen out of the rotting log it was on, the safety catch failed on the knife I was using and closed so heavily on my finger that it severe the nerves on the end of my index finger!

[channelsoph]

do you ever think about lichen

well i do now yeah… assuming you meant the fungi and algae symbiosis and not the skin disease.

last year i used to think a lot about mushrooms in general, cause the system of it is fascinating and scary. and of course because The Last Of Us

there was this book that i really liked called “Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds and Shape Our Futures” by Merlin Sheldrake. great mushroom book, 10/10 would recommend. i don’t specifically remember it focusing on lichen but it’s a great read all in all

i really liked the description of lichen on USDA Forest Sevice. they describe it as symbiosis of two separate organisms, fungus and algae, and the use phrase “dominant partner” for fungus. i bet someone already wrote a fanfiction/created art about this dynamic lmao i would be 100% down to read/behold

i’m fully yapping at this point but i held an art exhibition last year which explored macro and microstructures and there was this girl who’s art stood out to me. her art process was that she gathered samples of organisms in the forest, studied them under a microscope and created her works based on those studies. the outcome were these beautiful abstract paintings where she used different media to convey the structure of those organisms. one of the paintings was named “Moss and Mushrooms”, i think it does the fungus justice

Lea Hoffbauer, “Moss and Mushrooms”, 2020 (on the right)

here’s a link to her website if you want to explore more of her works <3

[lichenhaunt]

I had a dream last night that we hung out in person and you gave me stellar outfit advice 🖤

A sign from God himself ur taste is trash tbh

[lichenaday]

Any cool lichens to look out for in New Zealand? Google says not that many endemic species, but I'd love to find something unique or unusual ...

Because New Zealand is so ecologically diverse, it has a lot of really cool lichens! Check out the New Zealand Plant Conservation Network's page on lichens, where they have some free illustrated guides and ID keys you can download. How awesome is that?

If there was one lichen I would be on the hunt for while there, it would be Pulchrocladia retipora

Closely followed by Rexiella sullivanii

[witchstone]

i asked an angel what the deal with lichen was and they got really skittish and told me they could give me the answer to anything in the universe but to please not ask them about the lichen

[liches-covered-in-lich]

2, 3 and 10 for the artist ask game!! :D

(ha ignore that it has been Almost a Year AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH)

Thanks for the ask, bestie!!!

2. Is it easier to draw someone facing left or right (or forward even)

From the front as I can just cheat and use the mirror tool. But it makes adding details fun hehehe

3. What ideas come from when you were little

Oh as a kiddo, I fuckin LOVED minecraft. I had so many mincraft ocs from the game, Aphmau roleplays, and devianart comic series! Also funny enough, that one 3d ninja turtle series gave me a lot of inspiration. I made a cat dragon hybrid oc!

10. Favorite piece of clothing to draw

S l e e v es. Especially puffy ones. I love the folds <3 makes me fall in love with art all over again

[botanyshitposts]

hey i found this guy in ireland by the sea recently- looks like it's growing in waves?

any idea what's up with that?

thanks!

asks to put in the vault for a simple answer in 100 years when humanity learns how lichens work

[silentheiss]

“Five years?” Shen Qingqiu gasped. “I can’t see my husband for five years, because you can’t write a single fucking page of an adequate plot?”

Shang Qinghua took another step back. He’s been doing it every couple of minutes since he’s burst into Shen Qingqiu’s house, carrying the worst news ever.

“Well, to be completely fair, this particular plot line didn’t make it to the novel!” The hamster of a man squeaked. Shen Qingqiu knew he was making himself look pathetic on purpose. He took great satisfaction in knowing that it wouldn’t help him in the slightest.

“Oh! In such case it’s fine I guess! Your shitty novel didn’t suffer.” Shen Qingqiu snapped his fan open and took a step towards Shang Qinghua. “It’s only a small matter of my marriage, then.”

“Cucumber-bro,” Shang Qinghua pleaded. “I’m so, so sorry, but at least I got here in time, right? What’s five years for immortal cultivators? Painful death would be much worse.”

He was right about that, at least. Painful death that Shen Qingqiu was about to inflict on his ex-best-friend would be horrific.

“I will kill you now.” He said. “Don’t forget to tell me how painful it is.”

Shang Qinghua scrammed. Shen Qingqiu let him, but only because his knees were a little weak and he wasn’t about to embarrass himself by collapsing in the middle of murder attempt.

He took a careful breath and lowered himself on the nearest surface, which turned out to be the floor, but he was at his house and there was no one to witness that. He could sit on the floor all he wanted. Because his husband got himself cursed and wouldn’t be coming back home anytime soon — if at all.

Five years.

Shen Qingqiu sat on the floor of Bamboo House for what must’ve been a long time, because when Liu Qingge barged in it was already dark.

“Shixiong.”

“Liu-shidi.” Shen Qingqiu blinked up at him. “Why are you here?”

“Your disciples worried.”

Ah, Ming Fan and his snitching habits.

“This master is fine.” Shen Qingqiu said. He didn’t try to stand up — his legs have long since gone numb.

“You don’t look fine, do you?”

Liu-shidi, since when are you so talkative?!

Shen Qingqiu frowned and decided not to deign his martial brother with an answer.

“Binghe got cursed.” His mouth said without his consent. “Eternal Heart-Penury Winds. In Lichen Caves. He forgot me and everything connected to me. It’s not for actual eternity, though, if I stay away from him for five years. If I fail, and he sees my face for even a second, then it’s for eternity. How’s that?”

Liu Qingge didn’t say anything. Which, of course he didn’t. What was Shen Qingqiu even thinking, talking to him about it? He knew his Shidi was allergic to feelings of any kind.

It’s just that he wouldn’t see Luo Binghe for five whole years. They’ve been married for four and a half. How was one supposed to react to such a thing?

“I’ll make you some tea.” Liu Qingge muttered and left the room. Shen Qingqiu stayed on the floor, mind just as numb as his body.