Bifungites is Annulitubus, at least sometimes

[Halichoeres]

Bifungites ("two mushrooms") is a trace fossil that looks like two mushrooms on one stem, corresponding to a burrow consisting of a tunnel with two enlarged chambers. A new paper reports a Bifungites burrow with an occupant still inside, an annelid worm described in 2015 called Annulitubus. This fossil comes from the Devonian of Brazil.

Here are several examples of the fossil burrows, with panels k and l showing the worm inside.


Sedorko et al., open access in Earth History and Biodiversity: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2950475924000029

[Torvosaurus]

I really, really hate worms. Actually, I'm afraid of them, scolecophobic to the extreme. That's why I took up fly fishing. But I do enjoy reading about them, lol.

Torvo

[Faelrin]

I'm not gonna lie a lot of those look like the stinkhorn, if we are sticking to the mushroom analogy. Image A looks a bit more like your typical short stalked wide cap mushrooms. 

Anyways though, nice to see them find some evidence of what produced some of these burrows anyways, and something already previously described.

I tried looking for the paper of the original description of this worm genus, and immediately came across a paper published earlier this year of a new species from this genus:

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/08912963.2024.2380359?src=

T @Torvosaurus I'm sorry to see you have a phobia of them. I actually really adore some (annelid) worms, like the common earthworm or nightcrawler, especially the giant marine tubeworms, also Christmas tree worms, and even leeches. Though I totally get being set off from other parasitic worms (annelids or other), and especially things like the Bobbit worms, or blood worms.

[Torvosaurus]

@Faelrin I hate them. I was planting a small bush next to the house a number of years ago. I saw an earthworm in the hole I dug, I shrieked like a banshee and jumped back 10 feet, literally 10 feet. I was trembling.
 
Then I looked around, embarrassed, to see if any of my neighbors saw me. Luckily nobody did.

I laugh about it now, but I still hate/fear them.

Torvo

[Halichoeres]

I can see finding worms sort of repulsive, especially leeches. We've all got something like that. I worked with someone who studied some of the most venomous fishes on the planet (stonefishes, waspfishes) and handled them without any problem, but was absolutely petrified of even the most harmless snakes.