Fig. 84.
Frond of lichen (peltigera), showing rhizoids.
If we take one of the leaf-like forms known as peltigera, which grows on damp soil or on the surfaces of badly decayed logs, we see that the plant body is flattened, thin, crumpled, and irregularly lobed. The color is dull greenish on the upper side, while the under side is white or light gray, and mottled with brown, especially the older portions. Here and there on the under surface are quite long slender blackish strands. These are composed entirely of fungus threads and serve as organs of attachment or holdfasts, and for the purpose of supplying the plant body with mineral substances which are in solution in the water of the soil. If we make a thin section of the leaf-like portion of a lichen as shown in [fig. 85], we shall see that it is composed of a mesh of colorless threads which in certain definite portions contain entangled green cells. The colorless threads are those of the fungus, while the green cells are those of the alga. These green cells of the alga perform the function of chlorophyll bodies for the dual organism, while the threads of the fungus provide the mineral constituents of plant food. The alga, while it is not killed in the embrace of the fungus, does not reach the perfect state of development which it attains when not in connection with the fungus. On the other hand the fungus profits more than the alga by this association. It forms fruit bodies, and perfects spores in the special fruit bodies, which are so very distinct in the case of so many of the species of the lichens. These plants have lived for so long a time in this close association that the fungi are rarely found separate from the algæ in nature, but in a number of cases they have been induced to grow in artificial cultures separate from the alga. This fact, and also the fact that the algæ are often found to occur separate from the fungus in nature, is regarded by many as an indication that the plant body of the lichens is composed of two distinct organisms, and that the fungus is parasitic on the alga.
Fig. 85.
Lichen (peltigera), section of thallus; dark zone of rounded
bodies made up largely of the algal cells. Fungus cells
above, and threads beneath and among the algal cells.
201. Others regard the lichens as autonomous plants, that is, the two organisms have by this long-continued community of existence become unified into an individualized organism, which possesses a habit and mode of life distinct from that of either of the organisms forming the component parts. This community of existence between two different organisms is called by some mutualism, or symbiosis. While the alga enclosed within the meshes of the fungus is not so free to develop, and probably does not attain the full development which it would alone under favorable conditions, still it is very likely that it is often preserved from destruction during very dry periods, within the tough thallus, on the surface of bare rocks.
Fig. 86.
Section of fruit body or apothecium of lichen (parmelia),
showing asci and spores of the fungus.