Are these fungi? (1 Viewer)

I found these growing on moss yesterday in West Yorkshire. There were dozens of them all around 0.5mm or less and seem to be releasing plenty of dark spores. Does anybody know they are?

Thanks for looking.

Charlie.

Hi Charlie,

No, not a fungus - These are fruitbodies of a myxomycete.

Since we don't have a myxo section in the forum I guess we can just deal with them here

I'm unfortunately a bit out of touch with these little guys but I'd suggest looking in the genera Physarum and Didymium, which both have dark spores and a light coloured capillitium (visible in your nice photos).

If I remember rightly, Didymium has crystals covering the peridium which separates it from Physarum (which doesn't).

Cheers,
Nick

Hi Nick,

I should know by now that any fungi-like object that has me puzzled usually turns out to be an undentifiable slime mould. Although to be fair you have narrowed it down a fair bit. Many thanks as always.