Where did the time go? Well, some of it went to walking in the woods.
Continue reading “The last day of February”
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The last day of February
More fungus
From today’s walk.
Have some mushrooms.
Oddities
Well, not all of them are odd, but certainly there were some on a recent walk.
This was the first one. Why had someone chiseled 3 holes into this tree trunk? It was done by humans, not animals; I know pileated woodpeckers peck rectangular holes, but they aren’t quite as rectangular and smooth-sided as this. And it looked like it was a few years old, and dug in rather than being a simple blaze.
But here’s the other thing—the tree originally caught my eye because it was so obviously 2 trees nestled together; the trunks stood out because they were differently coloured.
Except they weren’t. Higher up, they were clearly joined, and in fact the split doesn’t go through to the other side of the tree.
This burned out stump wasn’t an oddity, particularly, but the hole was like an eye to the rest of the forest.
Another oddity. When trees fall over I’m not used to seeing the end with the roots suspended fifteen feet up. (It had fallen into the space between two other trees and jammed fairly high off the ground, and the weight of the crown had pulled the root ball into the air.)
And this isn’t an oddity at all, just some nice fungus.
And a detail, because I can.
Winter light
The light of a winter sun is one of my favourite things. So have some beauty to share.
Bird’s nest fungus
The wee, wee eggs!
Actually, they’re fruiting bodies. It’s from the Nidulariaceae family, if you’re into the Latin. Wikipedia says, The nests are “splash-cups”. When a raindrop hits one at the right angle, the walls are shaped such that the eggs are expelled to about 1 m away from the cup in some species.
This is growing on our back gate. I’m not sure it’s a good sign for the overall health of our gate.
From January 14th
From yesterday’s walk in the woods.
Snowy walk
From a couple of days ago.
The bark mulch
…seems to have turned into a compost heap. Well, it is almost two years old. But really, I got quite a shock when I walked by and saw what it was growing.
These are really odd mushrooms: they don’t seem to have a top over their gills.
I think it must have rotted away as they aged, but I’m not sure.
At any rate, they’re roughly 2 inches in diameter, and there’s LOTS of them.
Still pretty, though they’re certainly past their “best by” date.
This appears to be what they look like before they unfurl.
And maybe this as well?
But these are definitely not related. It’s a convivial mulch pile, evidently.
Today’s walk
…was rather nice, considering it rained for some of the time.
We found mushrooms. (This one was about 8 or 9 inches in diameter.)
We found a strange white fungus on a tree trunk, oozing liquid.
We found autumn leaves, of course.
We found the edge between sandstone and cedar.
We found apples!
We found one of the most beautiful nurse logs I’ve ever seen.
We found the vegetation at the edge of the marsh, all in layers.
We found autumn leaves in the cleft of a rock.
We found a very good time with friends.
February fungus
Just ’cause.
Fungus, fungus everywhere
Look what I found!
So: last week I went for a walk on a Brand New Trail™ just cleared a few days previously… Continue reading “Fungus, fungus everywhere”
Shroom season starts
It’s that time of year again.
Gills
It’s time for pictures of the underside of fungus. Continue reading “Gills”
Social patterns
Yesterday I hauled out the camera, as mentioned in that day’s post, and went fungus-hunting. These are some of the little beauties I found—I think you can probably guess that the theme is patterns. They all just seemed so… friendly. Continue reading “Social patterns”
Fuzzy wuzzy
I decided to go mushroom hunting in our yard—to photograph, not to eat, as I’m no mushroom expert—and found this. Odd, isn’t it? I suspect it’s a parasitized mushroom overrun by some kind of furry slime mold, probably something like this, but who knows what lurks in the heart of our yard? I’ll post pictures of more mundane fungus tomorrow.
Shadowed mushroom
Unexpectedly popping up by big rock.
Sweating fungus
But such pretty sweat.
Well-organized white fungus
What I thought was interesting about this fungus was its rather obsessive organization. There it is with a smooth, even covering of the tree trunk, and then intermittently it suddenly puts out a shelf at almost precise right angles—fluted and curling a bit to be sure in the direction of the shelving, but at a pretty consistent thickness, without any extreme thick-to-thin transitions.
Most fungi that I’ve seen are a lot sloppier in their assemblage. This one looks like it has a compulsion to be tidy.
Concentric
…fungus.
