Lol, I asked ChatGPT to identify the towering mushroom you mentioned.. and it made a sexual innuendo joke instead..

The response:

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Summary answer

• The fossil in question: Prototaxites.

• Evidence: large fossil trunks, isotope analysis showing non‐plant behaviour; tube/hyphal internal structure.

• Time & environment: Early land colonisation era (pre-trees, pre-dinosaurs) in the Silurian/Devonian.

• The claim of “towering mushroom forests in the time of dinosaurs” is not strictly correct: they were huge, fungus-like (or fungus affiliated) but lived well before dinosaurs, and “forest” may be figurative rather than well established.

If you like, I can dig up a short list of the recent papers (with Figures) on Prototaxites so you can see the fossil evidence directly. Would that be helpful, Rob Mpucee?

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That’s a wild answer lol. Although it technically did answer the question.