Club Fungi Section 8-4

Club Fungi  Club fungi are named for the structure that produces their sexual spores.  This structure is called a basidium which means “club”.  These are located on their fruiting bodies.  Most club fungi are saprophytes.

Mushrooms  Have you ever eaten a mushroom? If so, you ate a club fungi.  Mushrooms are made up of many hyphae, and they have a cap lined with gills and basidia.  When spores mature, they drop to the ground.  Life cycle on page 133

Rusts and Smuts  They are parasitic fungi that often cause severe diseases in plants and crops.  They do not form fruiting bodies. They form sexual spores on basidia.

Sac Fungi 8-3

Sac Fungi  Unlike molds, sac fungi have cross walls in their hyphae which have tiny spores in them.  The sexual spores are produced in tiny sacs, hence their name.  They also produce asexual spores.

Yeasts  Single-celled fungi that usually do not form hyphae. They form filaments under certain conditions.  Obtain their energy through a respiratory process called fermentation.  Often reproduce by budding.

Cup Fungi  Saprophytes that grow in soil.  The sexual spores are produced on the fruiting body.  Hyphae line the inside of the fruiting body. These hyphae produce the spore filled sac of the cup fungus.  Spores remain inside the sac until they mature.  The sac then bursts open

Lichens  Two organisms living together: a fungus and an alga.  The two have a symbiotic relationship: each organism helps the other.  Alga provides nutrients, the fungus provides water and carbon dioxide needed for photosynthesis.