Here is a quickcam photo of Jenais with some other students around the Shiitake log she brought in. She has a friend who raises Shittakes, and she told us about how it is done. You buy or cut a log--in this case a tan oak log. Then you drill holes into it. Using dowels which have been dipped in the "spawn" (spores) of shiitakes, you place the dowels into the holes. The mushrooms then grow right out of the log! The MYCELIUM of the fungi, which looks like a cobwebby type substance, grow into and throughout the log, and the mushrooms are like the "fruit" of the mushroom organism. Mushrooms are therefore called "fruiting bodies".

BTW, Jenais is the one whose head seems to be growing out of the log!

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Jenais and Dana Boddy also did a little research and drew a Shiitake using Clarisworks Paint. Dana is also in the above picture. Below is their rendering plus information.

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