Gary Rinard, ape 8, of Huntsville, Alabama, for his question:

How can you tell mushrooms from toadstools?

Mushrooms are good to eat and toadstools are poisonous. That is the big difference. People who taste toadstools get horribly sick and often die. So it's very important to know which are the safe mushrooms. The mushrooms and toadstools are called fungus plants    and there are hundreds of different ones. And it so happens that some of the deadly toadstools look just like some of the safe mushrooms.

Only a super expert can be sure which is which. And even he never takes chances. For example, he is much to smart to taste a fungus plant he finds growing in the wild. One reason is that some mushrooms turn poisonous as they grow older. What's more, all sorts of bugs live inside wild mushrooms. It takes years of study to learn all the differences between mushrooms and toadstools. And a sensible expert only eats mushrooms sold in the markets. He knows these are the safe kinds, specially grown where insects and germs cannot reach them.