13 Friday Jan 2023
Posted in fungi
Velvet shanks (Flammulina velutipes) always look to me like they would taste delicious, like layers of crumpets dripping in runny golden honey. And, though I’ve never tried them, they are indeed edible; the commercially grown versions (also known as Enoki) can be purchased in cans and jars, very occasionally fresh in some supermarkets and many specialist food shops.
30 Friday Dec 2022
Posted in fungi
The pinkish-purple colour of this fungus makes its identification a little easier than many fungi, and is reflected in the epithet of its scientific name, Chondrostereum purpureum. Its common name, Silverleaf (or Silver leaf) fungus, comes from the damage the fungus can do as a parasite of some species of fruit trees.
I’ve only ever seen it on dead wood, as in these photos, where it starts off looking like a crust spread across the surface of the sawn end of a tree, then, as it grows, develops into brackets, with a hairy upper surface and white edges.
23 Friday Dec 2022
Posted in fungi
During my recent walks to marvel at the autumn colours of the Beautiful Beeches of Cwm George in Dinas Powys, I noticed that one of the Beech trees had, at some time in the past, succumbed to the ravages of time and weather and, where once a majestic giant stood tall, there was now a large, crumbling stump.
As well as a thick covering of fallen leaves, the greens of moss, ivy and a thin clump of grass, the stump was providing a home – and food – to fungi, a thriving colony of Sulphur tuft (Hypholoma fasciculare), one of our most common wood-rotters. I’m sure this is a fungus almost all my followers will have seen.
09 Friday Dec 2022
Posted in fungi
There wasn’t a horse to be seen but there were plenty of White saddles (Helvella crispa) poking through the leaf litter. I usually fiddle with the surroundings when I’m photographing fungi, clearing away the odd leaf or grass stem to provide a clearer shot but, today, I decided to show them as they really are, an integral part of this woodland ride.
02 Friday Dec 2022
Posted in fungi
Well, these were a surprise sighting from the beginning of today’s walk. They were growing on a road verge, next to a block of flats, in an area now called Penarth Marina but which was once Penarth Port, a huge area of working dockland.
This seems a bizarre place for earthtongues to be growing – the First Nature website explains that this species, which I’m fairly sure is Geoglossum cookeanum, is found ‘mainly in mossy, sandy grassland, often in dune slacks or on the edges of coastal pine forests’.
25 Friday Nov 2022
Posted in fungi
Here’s a teeny tiny bonnet mushroom for this week’s #FungiFriday, about the right size for a fairy to wear, one of those miniscule Mycena species you find growing amongst the moss on a tree in a damp woodland.
21 Monday Nov 2022
Posted in fungi
I’ve blogged about Alder brackets before (Oozing brackets, November 2021; Fungi Friday: Alder bracket, December 2016; and 353/366 Old Alder brackets, December 2020), so today I’m just going to share a photo of my most recent find of the golden globules of Alder bracket goodness.
18 Friday Nov 2022
Posted in fungi
I initially thought these were a type of funnel fungi, one of the several Clitocybe species perhaps but, as I’m only too well aware that I’ve forgotten most of what I ever knew – never much – about fungi identification, I consulted an expert, Emma [@Coalspoilfungi on Twitter]. Turns out I was wrong – no surprise there!
These are Brown rollrims (Paxillus involutus) and they were massive, the biggest at least 12 inches across. They were growing on a grassy verge, next to a very busy local road. Emma told me: ‘They would have been viscid when wet, but when dry, [are] the texture of silky soft pig leather. Gills, cap and stem bruise easily deep red /orange to dark brown / Blackening slowly.’ Fungi are just so fascinating!
11 Friday Nov 2022
As you can see, the Dusky puffball (Lycoperdon nigrescens) is very similar to the Common puffball but its skin is darker. Specimens are primarily found in coniferous woodland (mine was fruiting in a section of a local cemetery planted with various species of conifer), though these flexible puffballs can also be found growing amongst the dunes at the seaside and in the acid soils of heathland. According to Pat O’Reilly in his book Fascinated by Fungi, these fungi emit ‘an unpleasant gassy smell’ when their flesh is cut. I didn’t check!
04 Friday Nov 2022
For Fungi Friday, here’s a selection of the colourful waxcap and russula fungi I’ve discovered during recent local meanders. Enjoy!
earthstar 
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