Category: David

Redlead roundhead mushrooms are bright red and, when damp as here, a cap which is slightly glutinous. The vivid colour, shape and  glutinousness are hints that they may be related to the verdigris species featured a couple of days ago. It is indeed in the same genus.

Verdigris mushrooms are northern hemisphere fungi: from Europe, parts of Asia and of north America. Redlead roundheads originate in Australia. They were first recorded in Britain in the last century, almost certainly arriving on imported timber. Now quite common, but still most often found growing on wood chip mulch.

The vivid autumn leaves of a liquidambar tree in West Park. All pictures are of the same tree in West Park.

Close-ups of the leaves were shot from a park bench directly under the tree’s canopy. The full tree was as seen from different spots further round the lake.

The bluish colour looks unnatural, and not really quite the same as the patina formed on corroded copper. The glutinous appearance of dampened caps is also characteristic.

The colour of these mushrooms had already weakened slightly after heavy rain. As they age, the colour carries on fading. While even traces remain, the species is unmistakable.

Fatsia, starting to flower so late in the year that almost all other plants have already gone to seed. These were developing on one of the several bushes planted near the lakes in West Park.

Yet another cluster of honey fungus, these, growing on the pavement by a busy road, were even more weather worn.

Just a few yards from where the greylag geese were feeding, a sandy beach where a lone goosander was busy preening. It was probably a juvenile.

We went back the next day. Heavy rain overnight meant the sandy beach had disappeared, as has the goosander and the geese.