Dr.
Alison Pouliot
Ecologist, photographer and author
Independent researcher
Biel, Switzerland / Australia
Alison Pouliot is an ecologist, author and environmental photographer with an affinity for fungi. Her work spans both northern and southern hemispheres, ensuring two autumns and a double dose of fungi each year. Alison has conducted over 600 fungus workshops and forays and seminars and surveys over the last two decades.
As a scientist, Alison explores the natural world through an empirical lens. As someone who roams the forest daily, she relates to it with an aesthetic and sensory appreciation; a natural history of experience. Alison draws on both worldviews to stir a broader public consciousness in the way we relate to the forests, fungi and all life.
Alison’s writing and images appear in both academic and popular literature. Alison is author of The Allure of Fungi and co-author of Wild Mushrooming.
Field of research | Area of activity
Fungal survey, fungal conservation, photography and videography of fungi, narrative non-fiction
Keywords related to mycelial space
Fungi, ecology, mycology, fungus photography, fungal conservation, fungus education
Related projects
2022 Slow Mushrooming
2021 Bioluminscence Festival of Fungi
2021 Spineless
2019 The Science and beauty of fungi
2019 Soils for Life – The Fungus Whisperer
2015 Environmental Humanities Laboratory – Fungi
NSW Government Fungus Discovery Video Series
Fungi of the Central Tablelands guide
Selected publications
Wild Mushrooming: A Guide for Foragers, Melbourne 2021 (co-authored with Tom May)
The Allure of Fungi, Melbourne 2018
»Endless Forms Most Bizarre«, in: Australasian Plant Conservation 24/3 (Dec 2015–Feb 2016), 14–15
»A Meander in the Mycosphere«, in: Intervalla 3 (2015), 13–25
»The Fungal Garden«, in: Australian Garden History 27/1 (2015), 15–17
»Unearthing: A Foray into Fungal Underworlds«, in: Earthsong 3/1 (2015), 12–15
»Rethinking the Fungal Dimension of Biodiversity«, in: Park Watch 257 (2014), 30–31
»A Forgotten Kingdom«, in: Wildlife Australia (Spring 2014), 12–17
»It’s Time for a Global Strategy for Plant and Fungus Conservation«, in: Australasian Plant Conservation 22/4 (2014), 22–23 (co-authored with Tom May, Sapphire McMullan-Fisher, Peter Buchanan, Lyn Allison, Jasmin Packer)
»Mycoentanglement: Public Perceptions of Fungi in Biodiversity Conservation«, in: Fungal Conservation 4 (Feb 2014), 46–52
»Environmental Justice for Unregarded Others: Human Responsibility For A Forgotten Kingdom in World Conservation and Agriculture«, in: Looking Within: Finding an Environmental Justice and Global Citizenship Lens, ed. Karen Druffle, Oxford: Interdisciplinary Press 2013 , 67–74
»Fleeting Lives«, in: Philosophy, Activism, Nature 10 (2013), 133–136