At times the greys are the colour of mourning, but a blustery, showery September morning gives more variety than most months, sometimes changing so fast that it's hard to keep up.
The greens are hanging on despite the thrust towards autumn and a shaft or two of sun helps their cause a lot.
Bracken in the woods is still a strong force and the fronds survive longer than out in the open. But it's never able to dominate to the same extent where shade and root competion are factors, and you can always walk through it to explore the pathless areas.
The wood floor displays many signs of autumn, more under the beeches than anywhere. Fungi are abundant and the redder ones quite easily spotted, from the Russulas, bleached white underneath and where the slugs have nibbled the caps to the more suspect ones not found elsewhere.
This is the Beechwood Sickener and the name is enough to warn off anyone looking for a free meal. The related one called simply the Sickener is more associated with pines.
2 comments:
Beechwood Sickener! I am so struck by the apt name. What would have the stomach to tolerate it but a slug?
I bow the neck before such superior knowledge.
I'm told the English names of fungi are mostly of fairly recent origin. Patrick Harding who has written numerous books on fungi, edible and otherwise, lives nearby. He once confided that, when writing one of his fungi identification books, he became bored by the predominance of latin names that would mean very little to his readers; so he decided to invent some English names himself to give some interest and variety to the book. Several of those names apparently stuck and are now commonly used.I'm not sure if the Beechwood Sickener is one of these. As for slugs what can they not eat? Anything that keeps them away from my veg garden is OK by me.
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