This wet autumn has seen a bumper crop of fungi, with many appearing in places where I had never seen them before. When I say fungi, I really mean the fruiting bodies. They grow from the mycellium, which is a network of fungal threads from which the fruiting bodies grows, is present all year round.
BEWARE: The following have not been formally verified yet.
This year, it started to rain in September and seemed to keep going through October and November. Flushes of fungi soon followed.
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| Earth ball, Manor Park, 10 Aug 2019 |
The first to appear include the Boletales such as Earthballs (Scleroderma citrinum).
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| Sulphur Tuft, West Park Nature Reserve, 05 Oct 2019 |
These are followed by "toadstool" shaped fungi. On one of the Uckfield Nature Reserve Supporters walks, we saw several different types such as the Sulphur Tufts (Hypholoma fasciculare) shown above.
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| Magpie Inkcap, West Park, 06 Oct 2019 |
We also found inkcaps such as the Magpie Inkcap (Coprinopsis picacea).
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| Fly Agaric, Manor Park, 13 Oct 2019 |
Closer to home, near a birch, I was amazed to see Fly Agarics (Amanita muscaria). I had never seen them in that particular place before.
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| Parasol, Buxted Park, 26 Oct 2019 |
Towards the end of the month, a Parkrun took me into grassy habitats where I saw large Parasols (Macrolepiota procera) including the three above.
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| Club, Manor Park, 06 Nov 2019 |
The weather had been too wet for our gardener to mow the lawn and some fungi such as this Apricot Club (Clavulinopsis luteoalba) had time to grow.
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| Oysterling, West Park, 24 Nov 2019 |
As the colder weather rolled in and the fallen leaves began to rot down, the bigger "toadstools" mostly disappeared but, during a Uckfield Nature Reserves Supporters walk, we noticed that a variety of small fungi and large brackets were taking their place. We found the tiny Oysterling (Crepidotus epibryus) above on a leaf.
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| Common Birds Nest, West Park, 24 Nov 2019 |
We also found my first ever Common Birds Nest fungi (Crucibulum laeve). The spores are contained in the tiny eggs, which are splashed out of the nest by raindrops.
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| Clouded Funnel, West Park, 24 Nov 2019 |
One of the few bigger fungi still present was the frost resistant Clouded Funnel (Clitocybe nebularis).
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| Southern Bracket, Buxted Park, 09 Nov 2019 |
Brackets such as the Southern Bracket (Ganoderma australe) also persist in the increasingly cold weather.
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| Crystal Brain Fungus, Manor Park, 01 Dec 2019 |
The recent winds have blown quite a few branches down. When I picked this one up, I got a rather unpleasant surprise as I found myself clutching something very squishy! It is Crystal Brain Fungus (Exidia nucleata), whose translucent blobs have solid white dots in - much like frogspawn on a stick!
I've put away my books and camera for a while, but I can confidently say that I have never seen such a wonderful variety of fungi.
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