Every single one of us makes a difference every day —
it is up to us as to the kind of difference we make.
—Dr. Jane Goodall, scientist, conservationist, humanitarian
(April 3, 1934–Oct. 1, 2025)
•••
Listen: Fungus gets a bad rap.
But the intricate microscopic web
of lacy white filaments
that make up mycorrhizal fungi—
in existence for 400 million
years—have learned to live
in symbiosis with 90% of all
species on the planet. You can
sometimes spot them branching
atop soil, their delicate strands
entwined like fingers. But they
typically connect plants via
underground fungal highways—
the wood wide web, scientists joke—
sharing nutrients and sending
warning signals about drought
or pest attacks. Literally feeding
each other, these invisible helpers
bolster the resilience of every
living thing around them as they
sink carbon into soil, fostering growth,
as they’ve done since the planet
was young. We topside beings
might take a lesson from such
supportive soil engineers that work
in harmony, in the dark, in silence,
forming mutually beneficial relationships
with species quite unlike themselves—
earthworms, fruit trees, tomatoes,
peppers, squash, flowers, grasses—
unseen threads that weave communities
together, never asking anything
of those they so peacefully serve.
•••
I learned about mycorrhizal (migh-koh-RIGH-zuhl) fungi decades ago from Dr. Jane Goodall when I heard her speak in San Francisco at the California Academy of Sciences where the Jane Goodall Institute was located. The notion that unseen networks can feed living things, in this case by a particular kind of fungi, was one of her metaphors for cooperation so desperately needed by humans. From chimpanzees to fungi and so much more, Dr. Goodall’s vast knowledge and gentle wisdom changed the world for the better in so many ways.
Güd wrtr 
Jan, what a beautiful, beautiful tribute and poem.
Extra-special.
with love,Amrita
Thank you, Amrita! An odd subject to be linked with Dr. Goodall, but a true story!
I love reading about mycorrhizal fungi. They are such a metaphor for the understanding we are all one.
In the Pacific Northwest, where I live on 12 acres that used to belong to my paternal grandparents, my grandmother knew indirectly of this mycorrhizal relationship. Seventy five years ago, she planted a small orchard, from which we are receiving a fall bounty of pie cherries, choke cherries, pears, apples, plums, and chestnuts. Before she put in those trees, she first planted two tiny Douglas fir seedlings at the edge of her future orchard. However, she called these evergreens “nurse trees” and the ancestral knowledge she had acquired from her parents and grandparents told her that they would do the heavy lifting of keeping all of her other deciduous specimens healthy, as well as the native Ponderosa pines interspersed and growing nearby. She new nothing of the mycelium network that these trees (which are not true firs, but more closely related to hemlocks) are the absolute best at propagating, something botanists and arborists have only recently discovered.
I credit that special knowledge for keeping what is now our orchard alive and healthy all these years, without the need for fertilizer or any other special soil amendments. As long as we keep water flowing to these trees from spring to the autumn months, they stay vibrant and productive. The two Douglas firs are now 85 inches in circumference at the base and 120 feet from root crowns to tips, and all but one of the orchard specimens have become giants in their own right, as have the pines. We harvest between one and three tons of fruit every season (and a nice smattering of chestnuts) from just fourteen trees.
Thank you, Grammie!
What a great legacy you’re carrying on! Love this story, Terry… and the 85-inch Douglas firs 120 feet tall… wow! That’s some mycelium network for those trees as well as your fruit orchard of “only” 14 trees! Very impressive.