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Fairy rings

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Desdemone:
Legends say that when the Fairy Folk sing and dance by the light of the moon a magic circle forms.
Those who enter the Fairy Ring and survive are said to hear that eldritch song when the moon is full.

But in the cold light of day there's a more prosaic explanation for fairy rings that contains a mystery all its own.

One such ring, over a dozen feet in diameter, appeared this week at River Road Park in Kankakee.

Marking the circle of dark green grass are large mushrooms and a few puffballs.

The mushrooms are the visible signs of an underground fungus, according to Bruce Spangenberg, an educator for the University of Illinois Extension.

The fungus, known as Maramius oreades, is usually found in most soils. It produces small tan-colored mushrooms that appear during rainy weather or later in the season. In some cases, a ring of brown or dead grass may appear.

As the mushrooms grow rapidly they can turn a cream color like those found at River Road.

Spangenberg said the fungi do not attack the grass directly, but do break down organic matter in the soil. Nitrogen is released to the grass above causing the bright green ring.

In cases where fungus gets very dense, grass may turn brown. It may also deplete soil nutrients and produce toxic levels of hydrogen cyanide.

Once the fungus exhausts the food supply, the mushroom ring vanishes.

Spangenberg gives the proper, scientific explanation for fairy rings, but somehow the magic is lost.

Just imagine a living mass lurking beneath the soil and sending its tendrils above to flower into mushrooms.

It may not be the Fairy Realm, but Mother Nature has her own magic to spare.

Loup_Garou:
I've actually taken Pathology courses at my college (it's an environmental science college) and I've got a further explaination for that

The reason it grows in circles is because of that exhaustion of resources in the soil. The fungus started out as a dot in the center of that ring, and spreads outward like a ripple, but as the resources in the center (where the fungus originated) are depleted, the fungus dies, leaving a ring-pattern that just keeps moving outward like a shock-wave.

Cool huh??? I love this kind of stuff ^_^

-Loup

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