On 15/09/2011 03:01 PM, clipka wrote:

> Being poisonous to eat /always/ gives you /some/ degree of competitive
> edge in evolution, unless the poison also affects animals from which you
> benefit more if they stay alive (e.g. animals that carry your seeds to
> other places), or requires too much energy to produce.

Consider another example.

The Black Widow's venom is very toxic to insects. Which isn't 
surprising, considering that this is what spiders usually eat. The venom 
is completely non-toxic to, say, cats. Which makes sense, since spiders 
don't eat cats. (And cats don't usually eat spiders.)

And yet, Black Widow venom /just happens/ to be lethal to humans. Not 
because there's any advantage to that, but just be coincidence.

And that's what I'm asking. Is mammal predation on fungi significant 
enough that it's worth developing defences against it? Or is the extreme 
toxicity of some fungi merely an unrelated accident?

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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