First, our team would like to apologize for the late update on the biodiversity of fungi and lichen here at UVa, the weather was our worst enemy during the past few months! The snow covered everything or it was too wet to observe on UVa grounds.

However, this past week has been mostly sunny and around 60-70 degrees fahrenheit so I decided to see if there were any fungi and lichen in the area near Alderman and Clemons library. Here are some of the photos I took in between classes!

At first, we don’t see anything unusual about this tree… but if we look closer…..

How about just a bit closer?….

Isn’t that beautiful? This appears to be a crustose lichen and sadly it was the only type of lichen I could find near this area.

Here we do not see anything but if we just zoom in closer then we see something interesting!

Ta da! These appear to be crustose lichen as well. I pass by this bench at least twice a day, and I did not realize this bench had lichens on it!

Biogrounds is all about increasing awareness of our neglected bioversity of on UVa grounds and hope to change the perception of what is considered as being nature. So next time you happen be sitting on a wooden bench or walk by a big tree, try to see if there are any of these crustose lichens!

Post by Sujin Hong, Third-Year, Environmental Science