Category: David

Blackberries, ripe and ripening, on a sunny morning earlier this month.

Horse’s hoof fungus ls also known as the tinder fungus, because it is the source of amadou, a substance which can be set aflame by a single spark.

Ötzi the Iceman, the prehistoric man found preserved in an Alpine glacier, had some amadou in a pouch.

Why are these mushrooms called tawny funnelcaps? They’re brown. They have a depression in the middle of their caps, making the caps look a bit like a funnel.

They are fairly common mushrooms of late summer and autumn, associated with trees – usually conifers.

Mushrooms so small that there caps were barely over the well-mown lawn outside the Chestnut Tree pub in Finchfield.

Brown roll rims are common mushrooms found in association with many species of trees.

They can be poisonous. Indeed, they can kill and have no known antidote, but this has only been known since the end of the Second World War.

Autumn view over the Severn valley looking down from Castle Terrace, Bridgnorth recently.