Sugardew

After the cold of frostpeak all blooms are valued, but none more than the colorful sugary orbs of the sugardew fungus.

It needs to be more of a 'catalyst', not a 'preparation food'. How can it 'trigger' more changes?

like how protein trigger nuptual flights in ants, eating this food, leaf, is something many creatures wait for before they undertake a big risky thing, like blooming, waking up from hibernation, metamorphosis.

• is it because it has many functions in different scenarios? In the subsoil it does one thing, in the treetops it does another.

Made by

• The fox-tailed: animals(creativity) and celestial(intelligence)

Key information:

• Sugardew- Sugary in thawroot -> quick, short energy, wake up -> small bulbs of bright color, mimicking berries, but with a spor-y grey underside. Feeds on fallen furs, decaying and fresh material and sunlight. Animals eat it, digest the spores, and poop out the spores later. It then needs another cycle of cold to sprout again.
• Sugardew hijacks the grasses around it, and uses it's photosynthesis to fill the 'berries' with sugary liquid. In turn it gives the grasses other nutrients that make them grow deeper roots and become tougher, but slower growing. Some blades of grass gain subtle streaks of the color of the sugardew berry. Occasionally one blade of grass can have multiple streaks of color from multiple sugardews. These grasses are often collected and dried and used in decoration and art by the dwarves.
• It comes out at varying times of the season; some years it doesn't come out at all.

You're as unreliable as the sugardew blooms

propagation

it spreads if furs are rubbed together. When two animals of the same fur meet, they exchange spores, then the fungus drops to the floor and sprouts if it falls on moist soil with nutrients.

• For each species it has a different variant, catering its needs to that animal's droppings and furs, and giving different nutrients suited for that species.

Risks?

• lack of fear?
• not seeing the bad
• toxic in high dosis? when synthesized it has very powerful effects, but very risky.
• self-righteousness
• taking on more than you can handle

Appearance

• It has a flowery scent about it in all 3 stages. Certain animals can even smell it in its spores.

The colorful orbs of sugardew grow to about 1-2cm big, they are growing from very short stalks.

They often grow in patches of up to 10 orbs close together, creating little patches of color.