Category Archives: lichen

161/366 Mite galls on Lime leaves

09 Tuesday Jun 2020

Posted by in insects, lichen, nature, trees

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These stopped me in my tracks!

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I’d enjoyed a nice amble around a local park and was on my way home when I spotted these incredible galls and just had to stop for some photos. The galls are caused by tiny mites that spend the cool winter months huddling in cracks on the tree’s bark, then head out on to the leaves when they sprout in the springtime.

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The mites are leaf-sap suckers, and their sap sucking causes a chemical reaction in the leaf, which in turn prompts the leaf to produce these small, conical, hollow growths. The mites are incredibly tiny – less than 0.2mm long apparently – so they’re almost never seen, whereas their cosy gall homes can grow to 8mm long and, when they’re as bright as these ones were, are very obvious on the leaves.

I’m not sure which mites these are as I’m not sure which tree species this is. One mite species, Eriophyes tiliae, is the gall causer on Large-leaved lime trees (Tilia platyphyllos), Common limes (Tilia x europaea) and some hybrid Lime species, and another mite, Eriophyes lateannulatus, causes very similar galls on Small-leaved Limes (Tilia cordata) and hybrid Limes.

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56/366 Spots and splashes

25 Tuesday Feb 2020

Posted by in fungi, lichen, nature

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Amidst all the greys and browns and dull greens of the wintertime natural world, there are still wonderful wee spots and splashes of colour to be found. These are some I found during today’s stomp around Cosmeston, a rather rapid stomp trying, unsuccessfully, to avoid the rain showers.

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I’m not good at identifying lichens but I do love their fresh, bright yellow-greens, especially on the twigs and small branches that have recently blown down from the tree tops.

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The tiny bursts of lollipop pink are Illosporiopsis christiansenii, a lichenicolous fungus (that’s a fungus which is parasitic on lichens, usually on Physcia tenella and sometimes on Xanthoria parietina).

And the pretty pops of orange, found on several fence posts, are Common Jellyspot fungus, Dacrymyces stillatus.

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29/366 Cladonia lichen

29 Wednesday Jan 2020

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One of the Cladonia lichen species is the food of Reindeer but I doubt this is it, though I don’t actually know which Cladonia species this is. As you can perhaps guess from the snippet of sign showing in my photo, the lichen was growing well on a signpost at the Wildlife Trust reserve I visited today. The brownish blobs on the tops of some cups are where the spores of these attractive lichen develop.

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330/365 A good day for lichens

26 Tuesday Nov 2019

Posted by in autumn, lichen, nature, trees

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‘There is a low mist in the woods—It is a good day to study lichens. The view so confined—it compels your attention to near objects—& the white background reveals the disks of the lichens distinctly—They appear more loose-flowing—expanded—flattened out—the colors brighter—for the damp—The round yellowish green lichens on the white pines loom through the mist (or are seen dimly) like shields—whose devices you would fain read.’  ~  Henry David Thoreau, A Year in Thoreau’s Journal 1851, Penguin, New York, 1993

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40/365 A rose by any other name?

09 Saturday Feb 2019

Posted by in 365DaysWildin2019, lichen, nature

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In this case, though, my rose is not a rose but a lichen that I thought looked a lot like the outline of a rose – my warped imagination perhaps, but pretty nonetheless. I spotted this on a gravestone during a wander around the graveyard that surrounds St Augustine’s Church here in Penarth. I presume it’s one of the Caloplaca species of lichen, possibly Caloplaca decipiens, but many of this species seem to look alike and I am not at all skilled in identifying lichens.

190209 Caloplaca lichen

6/365 On the fence

06 Sunday Jan 2019

Posted by in 365DaysWildin2019, insects, lichen, nature

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Much to the amazement – or perhaps the amusement – of Cosmeston’s dogwalkers, I spent rather a lot of time closely studying the tops of fence posts today. The variety of lichen to be found on them is really quite astonishing but I wasn’t only admiring the lichen. There were even more interesting things sitting on those fence posts …

190106 on the fence

Big picture, small picture

17 Saturday Feb 2018

Posted by in fungi, lichen, nature, parks

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The big picture:
a group of wooden posts, incised with rune-like writing, once part of a sculpture trail around Cosmeston Lakes Country Park.

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The small picture:
an incredible diversity of lichens, mosses and fungi in a surprising array of subtle textures and hues.

 

Bryophytes and lichens

11 Monday Dec 2017

Posted by in lichen, nature, parks, trees, winter

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Over the summer months my eye has been distracted by all the little creatures that move – butterflies and moths, dragonflies and beetles, and all manner of other insects – but now that it’s winter and those creatures have mostly disappeared (you’ll notice one crept in to one of my photos!), my eye is again drawn to the more static beauty that surrounds me. Take, for example, this small grove of trees at Cosmeston Lakes Country Park.

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I spent perhaps an hour here the other day, looking in wonder at the incredible variety of tiny lichens and bryophytes to be found on the tree trunks. I haven’t tried to identify these but I’m determined to return to them over the coming months to see which I can put names to and find out more about. For now, I just want to share their beauty.