World’s biggest fungus found under tree in China

by Deborah Byrd @ Earthsky.org

The BBC reported on Monday (August 1, 2011) that a Chinese professor has discovered the most massive fruiting body of any fungus yet documented, growing on the underside of a tree in Hainan Province, China. He and his team described their finding in the journal Fungal Biology.  The length of the fungus is 10 meters (33 feet). It is 80 centimeters (31 inches) wide and weighs half a metric tonne (about half a ton).