2021 was a big year for Planet Fungi building a network of like-minded people keen to learn more about fungi and its importance to life on this planet. Followers - 123K Instagram, 65K YouTube and 6K Facebook

We would like to wish all our followers a 2022 where life returns to some normalcy and fungi adventures abound.

We thank you all for your loyalty and support of Planet Fungi posts and fungi advocacy work.

We cherish our connection to fungi enthusiasts across the globe and enjoy your comments and sharing our discoveries with you.

Stephen is a Sony Ambassador and we would like to acknowledge Sony’s on-going support with state of the art equipment perfect for photographing and videoing fungi.

The presentation video How fungi changed my view of the world, we produced for YiXi Television in China (their equivalent of Ted Talks), has now received 3.3M views on our YouTube channel and millions more in China.

WOW we never could have imagined how much interest there would be, and we are so grateful.

As 2021 draws to a close we would like to share with you some of the highlights of the year for Planet fungi.

Planet Fungi – North East India

In late 2020 we released our Himalayan fungi safari documentary Planet Fungi – North East India, on our website, iTunes, Amazon and Google Play. It was also selected for the 2021 Fungi Film Festival.

In March 2021, the documentary started screening in China on IQIYI and YOUKU where in its first few weeks it trended no 5 and no 3 most popular documentary.

10% of earnings from this production support the work of our collaborators in India, the Balipara Foundation in Assam, who are helping to document and conserve fungi and the wilderness areas in the northeast region. The other earnings support Planet Fungi advocacy work in videos and presentations.

With your generous support after just 6-months we were able to give the good people at Balipara A$1500.00 with more to come in 2022.

A big thank you to all who have streamed the documentary … and if you haven’t and think you will enjoy a fungi adventure in an exotic and remote region on the planet click here to watch Planet Fungi – North East India.

In this project we meet tribal peoples who tell us what they know about mushrooms, go to a fun village festival, visit the wettest region of the world, discover a “new to science” luminous mushroom and document some of the most stunning mushrooms we have ever seen.

Time-lapses and Footage in Fantastic Fungi

In July this year Fantastic Fungi started streaming on Netflix with huge success. We congratulate Louie Schwartzberg and Paul Stamets for the brilliant job they do of raising the profile of fungi and its importance to the planet.

You can watch the documentary on Netflix or go to https://fantasticfungi.com/film/ to find out more.

Fantastic Fungi features 20 of Stephen Axford’s fungi time-lapses.

The newly released education version of Fantastic Fungi also features Catherine Marciniak’s footage from our fungi safari in Patagonia Chile where we joined a field trip with mycologists from around the world, including the always inspiring Giuliana Furci from the Fungi Foundation who was a co-creator of the Fantastic Fungi Education Curriculum project - https://ffungi.org/eng/education/

If you would like to watch our video on the Patagonian Fungi Safari you can find it on our YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NklZ9KkVHxw

Follow the Rain

In 2021 we began production on a self-funded fungi safari in Australia where we follow the rain to find the fungi. In the Zombie Hunter sequence we catch up with Donovan Teale at Uki, on the east coast of Australia, where he takes us into the miniature world of fungus and insect battling it out on the underside of leaves. It’s a whole new look at entomopathogenic fungi.

With the help of Amy Christensen and Mickey Pascoe from Little Acre Mushrooms in Brisbane we’re also attempting to cultivate a very rare blue fungus from an endangered forest ecosystem – perhaps creating a rescue population. Fingers crossed. Keep an eye out for Follow the rain in late in 2023.

The Secret World of Fungi

We’re collaborating on an iMax documentary The Secret World of Fungi with British biologist Merlin Sheldrake, Producers Jo-anne McGowan, Jen Peedom and David Gross of Stranger than Fiction Films and Fungi iMax Pty Ltd. This project will feature Stephen’s time-lapses and is co-written by Catherine. You can read a more about it here. Due for release in 2022.

Dance of the Spores

Catherine started experimenting with filming spores being released from mushrooms and her first attempt Dance of the spores screened in London as part of Mycota, an immersive group exhibition interrogating the narrative materiality of mushrooms through contemporary design and craft practices, collaboration, research, and storytelling. You can watch her video and discover how and why spores appear to dance on the breeze on our YouTube channel.

The Earthshot Prize - Repairing The Planet

In a new series by Silverback Films for the BBC, The Duke of Cambridge and The Earthshot Prize showcase how we can work together to protect our planet. The Earthshot Prize aims to incentivise change and help repair the planet by identifying evidence-based solutions to the world’s biggest environmental problems. What a wonderful initiative. The documentary series features three of Stephen’s fungi time-lapses.

Common Sense Network

Planet Fungi were invited to include 12 of our video titles in the US based Sensical catalogue, a new streaming service for kids offering thousands of entertaining, age-appropriate videos and podcasts. https://www.sensical.tv/ And hot of the press, Sensical is nominated for “Best Kids-Only Streaming Service” at the Kidscreen Awards. Congratulations to the team for and this recognition of a great initiative

Putting names to the Mushroom Pics - A Fungi Resource

With the Dr Samantha Karunarathna, Mycologist at the Kunming Institute of Botany, China Academy of Sciences, Stephen is identifying the mushrooms he has photographed in China, India, Thailand and Myanmar. You can find them in the fungi galleries on Stephen’s website https://steveaxford.smugmug.com/Fungi Sam and Stephen have made a start and we are hoping when completed it becomes a great resource for fungi enthusiasts in Asia.

2021: Our year at Planet Fungi