Category: David

Sandy stiltballs are an unusual mushroom in Britain. For a few years in the 2010s, I kept finding them growing in sandy soil under roadside hedgerows in Shropshire.

First it was by a quiet country lane near Wyken. For two or three years they were there. Then no more.

Soon after, we noticed a patch by the main Bridgnorth to Wolverhampton road, very near the Rudge Heath roundabout. Once again, there for two or three years and not subsequently.

Perhaps there are some still, somewhere lurking in the area.

The blusher, yet another member of the same group of mushrooms as the panther or fly agarics. A few traces of the warts can be seen on some of these caps, but most had been washed off by rain.

A panther cap mushroom growing on the mossy lawn in front of a block of flats by a main road into town. Despite the more subdued colour of the cap, the white flecks of “warts” mark the fungus as related to yesterday’s fly agaric. The so-called warts are actually the remnants of a veil, a protective surrounding for the caps of this group of mushrooms when they are growing, pushing through the ground with some force.

Autumn’s the time of the fungi flush, the peak season for fungi to send out their fruiting bodies, especially mushrooms. Although the long hot dry summer has been replaced by damper weather, the season so far has been disappointing. So I’ve gathered some fungi pictures from the same month in previous years which I never got round to posting online at the time.

To start, that favourite of children’s book illustrators, a fly agaric, with its characteristic red cap speckled with white warts.

The distinctive mushrooms almost always grow in association with birch trees, often re-appearing in the same spot for year after year. This was an exception. Two small patches appeared in West Park in September 2013, with no signs of any subsequent return.

A young heron on the alert, standing at the edge of the canal as it passed the edge of Dunstall Park, seen several years ago.

Common darters, one of the more easily spotted dragonflies. Frequently found near water resting on vegetation or other flattish surfaces, wings outspread.