Spores the seeds of fungi

Fungi have spores, not seeds and don't reproduce the same way that plants do.

Spores- What are they?

Most fungi reproduce or make new fungi by producing spores. Each spore is microscopic but when we see them all released at once we can see a fine powder.

Each different type of fungi produces up to billions of spores with there own particular shape, size and colour. This helps researchers to identify the fungi when they look at the spores through a microscope with a magnification of over 400 times.

Spores are released when fully grown or mature from the 'fruit' of the fungi (it is not really fruit like that from plants).
Most fungi produce either one of two kinds of spores. One, a short lived spore which only travel a short distance and the other, permanent spores.

The names for the two groups that produce larger fungi are Ascomycetes = Shooting spores which includes over 30,000 different kinds like Mildews, Moulds, Cup, Flask, Primitive Truffles, Morels, Earth Tongues and Caterpillar fungi.
The other is the Basidiomycetes = dropping spores, which includes fungi like toadstools and mushrooms, bracket, Jelly, Club, Earthballs, Puffballs, Stinkhorns, Lattice or Basket, False Truffles, Birds Nest, Coral, Boletes and other fungi.

Some fungi release their spores from their gills under the cap of the fungi.

Boletes don't have gills but have thousands of tiny pores for their spores to come out. These are called polypores. Bracket fungi have pores for their spores too.

Possibly a Bolete Fungus

Underneath Orange bracket fungi showing the pores at 60x magnification.

Most spores are blown away in the wind but some are eaten by animals and pass through their gut and out the other end to start a new life. Puffballs and earth stars have no gills and release their spores out of a whole that opens at the top of the fungi. Here below in the photo is a soft puffball hole magnified at 60x.

Stinkhorns have no gills either so when this unusual fungus is ready to release its spores it breaks through the top to form a horn like stalk. At the top of this stalk is a slimy bad smelling substance which contains the spores. This might smell bad to us and keep us away but it attracts flies that walk in the foul slim and when the flies land on other plants the spores are wiped off to a new home.

This fungus is in the Gasteromycetes group and also smells bad and has little winged insects enjoying it.

Do fungi have female and male parts?

No. Each spore will develop directly into a fungus in the right conditions not like a seed where the male and female reproductive parts have to find each other on the flower to begin a new plant. There are two different kinds of threads or mycelia in spores from a fungus with different characteristics but can not be identified as male or female.
When these two different threads find each other from the same species of fungi they unite to form the first stages of a fruiting fungi and the material that will later produce spores. Some fungi can reproduce from one spore and don't need two different spores. Weird isn't it.

Spores of a fungi do not contain an embryo like a seed does and they do not hold much of a food reserve. Some fungi spores have only one cell like yeast and other species have several cells.

First;

Collect a mature well developed fungus from your yard. If you have them collect one with gills and one with pores. You could also try squeezing a puffball onto a sheet of paper.

Second;

Remove the cap off the stalk gently and place the cap onto a piece of paper that is white on one half and black paper on the other. This is because some fungi have brown spores and some have white spores and will not show up on white paper. Make sure the gills are facing down.

Third;

Place a wet cotton ball/s on top of the cap and place a glass or jar over the top of the cap to stop the spores from blowing away. Leave for at least four hours then remove your cap and what you see are the spores.

This is a spore print magnified 10x from a white gilled fungi.

This is the spore print magnified 200x from a brown gilled fungus in the photo on the left.