Maximum Fun
09 April 2026
Why aren't mushroom animals? Why is this mushroom growing out of a frog?? WHAT KIND OF MUSHROOM IS TOAD?!?! Well Sage the Bad Naturalist is here to answer all our festering fungus questions! Things we Talk About: Sponge LifecycleFungus LifecycleMushroom Growing out of FrogBunashimeji MushroomBlewit Mushroom Timestamps: (00:00:00) Intro (00:06:50) Why Aren't Fungi Animals (00:24:55) This is Planet Chitin (00:30:01) The Frog Mushroom Mystery (00:52:47) Questions for Sage (01:19:16) Outro Support us with a Max Fun Membership! Join our Discord! We also learn about: Maybe some day I’ll get to be on this podcast, don’t ask scicomm dad! fungal anatomy, mushrooms are just the short lived fruiting body, fungi don’t have seeds or leaves or photosynthesize, Fungi were just the weird plant for a while - just Jerry, fungi don’t have vasculature their more spongy, fungi are genetically closer to animals so why didn’t Jerry come to our family? coral are animals, coral and fungal reproduction cycles, you’re going to learn so much in this one Tom, “that’s cant be the reason why”, consequences of the divergence aren’t the reason - the divergence is the reason, we should have been wrong more right!, this is planet chitin, dark fungi, fungus is made of bug, oh we’ve found the thing that actually makes me want to throw up on the podcast, protect our chitinous brethren, the mystery of the mushroom growing out of a frog, sage’s frog theory whiteboard, no one has ever seen this before, first time we’ve seen it does not mean first time it’s happened, mucusy coincidence, the return of amphibian chytrid fungus, the scientists have moved on but Sage hasn’t, botanical anarchy, slowly dropping out of grad school, odd jobs, its f****d up that make up affects views, Toad is a bunashimeji, remember toad with legs is made of bugs, blewits are underrated, drawing on the artist’s conk mushroom. Help support this show and unlock bonus content! Become a member at https://maximumfun.org/joinlearn
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