“Fungi make worlds. They also unmake them. There are lots of ways to catch them in the act.”
– Merlin Sheldrake, ‘Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds & Shape Our Futures’
The clocks have gone back, evenings are drawing in, the sun is dimming, and mist is rising. Thoughts are turning towards the thinning of the veil between the living and the dead, this world, and the supernatural one.
I’m not much for Halloween; it feels like an excuse for too much sugar, but I can’t deny that the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain pulls at the story-loving part of my brain. The blood, guts, and psychological scares of horror films don’t appeal in the slightest, but the mythology and folklore of the past intrigues me.
Even the forest and the weather seem to want to get in on the act:
In the dimmest, darkest reaches of the forest, squishy, purple, jellified brains are oozing their way over the surface of the fallen. Life is emerging from the dead, and if that isn’t the definition of a zombie, I don’t know what is.
These are Purple Jelly Disc Fungus, Jellydrops (and isn’t that an amazing name?), or Ascocorynesarcoides, and they are unmaking the wooden worlds on which they proliferate and making their own in place of them. They grow mostly on the rotting wood of deciduous trees, particularly those affected by heart rot. Weirdly, they have been found growing on living wood as well and seem to present no ill effects to the host tree. In fact, trees that have been previously infected with Purple Jellydisc actually show some resistance to other fungal pathogens.
This is its young form; over time, each lobe of brain develops into a shallow cup shape and from there into a flattened disc. If you look at the photo below, you can see that there is a more cup-shaped blob at the back and a flattened disc at the front.
From what I can work out, the lifecycle of this fungus is complicated! It reproduces through the production of asexual spores on conidia (I think they’re the blobby bits) and sexual spores on the apothecia (they’re the flattened bits). I will freely admit that I may well be wrong about all of this … I’m not sure I have the correct knowledge to decipher what the guides are telling me.
They are suitably gelatinous and squishy for the season, though. Nature’s way of reminding us that mythology and folklore are rooted in reality.
“There’s husbandry in heaven, their candles are all out.”
– William Shakespeare, ‘Macbeth’
This is one of the few fungi that I am 100% positive I’ve identified correctly. It’s great; it makes me feel like I’m actually getting somewhere. I know, I know, it’s one fungus out of millions, but I’m a great believer in taking baby steps towards a goal and celebrating my successes (even if it’s only internally!)
These things are everywhere at this time of year. Or at least, they’re visible everywhere at this time of year; apparently, you can find them all year round. They’re called Candlesnuff Fungus, Stag’s Horn Fungus (not to be confused with the Yellow Stagshorn of my previous post), Carbon Antlers, Candlestick Fungus or, if you want to be all scientific about it, Xylariahypoxylon. They’re something I see regularly when I’m poking around in the forest with my nose two inches from bits of tree.
They grow in groups on decaying hardwood, often growing through moss. Their initial form is a simple stick-like body (stroma), which becomes much flatter, more twisted over time, and can develop a forked end. Whale tails breeching the damp wood and diving again in search of nutrients.
The white, powdery substance that coats the tip is asexually produced spores (conidia). These fungi are also able to sexually produce spores (ascospores), which are released through minute ostioles in the surface of the stroma. The whole fruiting body darkens as these ascospores become mature until it is all dark grey or black.
There’s always something to learn, though, even when something is ridiculously familiar. This species is actually a bioluminescent fungus and emits light constantly, thanks to the phosphorus in the mycelium, which reacts with oxygen. This does make its name of Candlesnuff Fungus a little strange, given that its light is never snuffed out. I can only assume that it comes from its visual likeness to a blown out (or snuffed out) candle wick, rather than its actual light producing properties … or lack thereof. Sadly, the light it produces is so weak that it’s not visible to the naked eye and needs an absolute lack of external light and a long camera exposure to be seen. Luckily, I read this before I decided to go and scrabble around the forest floor in the middle of the night! I do wonder whether this bioluminescence is what makes the fungi seem to jump out of the forest floor in autumn when the light is dimmer. It does always seem to be particularly visible.
We’re not done yet, though. This weird little fungus is hiding a whole bunch more secrets. It has a host of possible medical uses*.
*takes deep breath*
It has been found to have anti-viral properties, inhibiting the growth of some viruses. It is anti-microbial, working against bacteria such as E.coli. It has been shown to reduce blood sugar levels in diabetic rats. An extract of the fungus has been shown to have cardioprotective qualities. It also contains compounds that are active against some tumours, inhibiting growth of breast, liver, and lung cancer cells. And finally, it has some neuroprotective properties, suggesting that it may be useful in treatments for Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease.
Not bad for a tiny, weird looking fungus, eh?
* Please note that I have ZERO medical training, only the ability to Google. This is not a recommendation to go round chewing fungus or relying on mushroom extracts instead of visiting an actual, qualified doctor. The properties identified above are based on initial scientific studies.
“I’m so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers.”
– L. M. Montgomery, ‘Anne of Green Gables’
Virginia Creeper drips in fiery rivulets through the branches of a tree.
As my Year 7 class finally falls silent, a herring gull on the Science block roof starts squawking incessantly. I debate the logistics of giving it a demerit for defiance.
The trainee teacher observing from the back of the room makes copious notes. I can’t help wondering what he’s writing down.
I turn on my torch; the hedgehog freezes. And then theatrically tiptoes away across the grass, lifting its paws high. Above me, the sky refuses to show any glint of the aurora.
Two crows plod across the grey, murky sky. On a mission; they have somewhere to be this morning.
Dew lies heavy on the field, glinting like frost in the first rays of the sun. Rumbling around, the lights of the tractor push their way through the gloom.
Two birds cheep at each other from opposing sides of the road, the sound bouncing and echoing between them.
A pigeon explodes from the depths of the ivy, flapping maniacally down the road in a shower of flowers, leaves, and berries.
Grace passes me in the corridor, stops, turns back, and asks, “Have I got you today, Miss?”
When I reply in the affirmative, she nods and looks pleased. A far cry from the student who wouldn’t set foot in my room a year or two ago.
“What happened to your hair, Miss?”
Nothing. I just chose not to straighten it this morning. Apparently, unruly curls were unexpected today.
A kestrel screams out frantically as it twists and turns through the pink and orange predawn sky, desperate to escape the mobbing crows behind.
On a rainy Saturday morning, a hazelnut, pear, and chocolate cake bakes gently, filling the house with a warm, autumnal fragrance; so much better than any artificial scent.
The big field maple at the end of the road glows golden in the evening sun. Or maybe its leaves are turning? It’s difficult to tell in the low light.
Anelia lags behind to talk to me on the way to lesson, “Can I give you a duck?” she asks, shyly proffering a small orange, plastic duck.
“Thank you, Anelia, you made my day!”
The light shining on the forest floor is gilded by the sunshine streaming through the autumn leaves overhead.
“I’m for uncertainty. As soon as you think you know, you’re done for. You don’t listen and you can’t hear. If you’re certain of anything, you shut the door on the possibility of revelation, of discovery.”
– Alan Garner, ‘Boneland’
I like Garner’s idea of uncertainty (almost as much as I like his book, ‘The Weirdstone of Brisingamen’ – if you haven’t ever read it, you’re missing out); the concept that concrete knowledge stifles further discovery is absolutely in my wheelhouse. I certainly find that not knowing comes in handy when I’m analysing texts; it really helps me constantly consider ideas that are slightly outside the box (and encourage my students to do the same) and has led to some real lightbulb moments. Not that I think all of the students appreciate it … they definitely prefer to be given specific chunks of knowledge that they can commit to memory (or not) rather than being allowed the freedom to throw ideas at a text and see what sticks. But I like it. I had a moment last week when, halfway through a lesson, I suddenly had an epiphany about the bit of Lady Macbeth’s rambling, sleepwalking monologue when she says, “… there’s knocking at the gate.” We always talk about her reliving the events of the fateful night when Duncan lay dead in his bedchamber, and Macduff arrived (literally knocking at the door) to discover the crime, but perhaps she’s also foreshadowing Macduff’s upcoming interruption of their life and reign over Scotland. He is metaphorically knocking at the door as he approaches Dunsinane with Malcolm’s army. Food for thought certainly.
Perhaps my lack of certainty helps me enjoy the natural world as well; there is a certain sense of wonder engendered when you’re really uncertain of what you’re looking at. The herbaceous species of which I’m most certain are the ones that fade into the background and become barely noticeable beyond feeling ‘normal’. Exploring the unknown world of invertebrates this summer has given me an enhanced sense of connection with what I’m seeing.
Given that my mycological knowledge is patchy at best and non-existent at worst, there seems very little risk that I’m going to lose my sense of wonder at the fungal world any time soon. Even when I’m pretty sure I know what something is, as soon as I go away to confirm my suspicions, I discover that, actually, it’s something completely different and I didn’t know as much as I thought I did.
I regularly see these braillesque (brailley? braillish?) spots on fallen trees in autumn and winter. I’d always noticed them, ticked them off as immature specimens of King Alfred’s Cakes (Daldinia concentrica) … and then pretty much ignored them. It was only when I was happily poking around a while area of felled hardwoods that it occurred to me that they didn’t look quite right. The discs were the right colour for Daldinia, they were the right texture for Daldinia, but there was something slightly off about their shape. Instead of being blobby, they were flattened; almost geometrically so in places. They also didn’t seem to be growing from pre-existing faults in the wood, instead erupting through the bark like aliens through the ribcages of spacefarers in Ridley Scott’s ‘Alien’. (What can I say? It’s nearly Halloween, so I’m embracing the horror genre for a while)
I turned to my trusty Encyclopedia of Fungi (and Google) and discovered that this is a diatrype fungus called Beech Barkspot (Diatrype disciformis).The discoids are the fruiting bodies of this species and are covered in darker dots (ostioles) through which its ascospores (sexually produced spores) are released. Just in case you were wondering, despite being called Beech Barkspot, they also grow on lots of other species of Broadleaf tree, including Birch, Hazel, and Oak.
The raised discs seem to spell out a mysterious message, addressed to whom I’m not sure. They form oh-so tactile lines along the length of branches, along which I always want to run my fingers, desperate to understand what they’re trying to say.
Would I read them left to right or in reverse? From where did the words appear? What was their message? Is this a diatribe against the turning of the seasons or a hymn in praise of progress?
“A book, too, can be a star, a living fire to lighten the darkness, leading out into the expanding universe.”
– Madeleine L’Engle
Deep in the forests of Norfolk, amongst the undergrowth, half buried in spongy cushions of moss or submerged in drifts of dried grass, a fire has been lit.
Tiny golden flames flicker brightly at the base of a huge Scots Pine, illuminating the forest floor disproportionately to their size. The autumn colour so lacking in the canopy overhead has found a home in the leaf litter. This is, I think, Yellow Stagshorn (Caloceraviscosa). The bright inferno stems from a tight cluster, and its flames are forked multiple times along their length.
I see lots more of these tiny fires kindled throughout the forest. Each brightens its environs, surprisingly visible, even with the fallen leaves that are beginning to appear.
Another trickle of flames runs down the side of a felled tree. It has a deeper glow, more orange in tone than the previous. Each little flame stems from a separate, scattered point of origin, like drops of accelerant that have caught light. There are very few forks in these tongues of fire. I believe this conflagration might be that of Forked Stagshorn (Calocera furcata). Although, looking at the distribution maps, I’m less sure. Also, on re-reading that last sentence, I think I’ve even confused myself. Why would Forked Stagshorn have so few forks? Where did I get that little nugget of information from?
Now I’m thinking maybe Small Stagshorn (Calocera cornea). It’s growing on a fallen broadleaf tree ✅️ It has very few forks ✅️ Each fruiting body is shorter than my finger is wide (now there’s an accurate measurement!) ✅️ It’s looking good.
Is it possible to be even less sure than I was? Probably not, but I’ll give it a damned good try. Never let it be said that I know what I’m talking about.
Whatever this may be, I’m pretty sure (read: not even a tiny bit sure) it’s something different to the first one.
“Imagination is the Discovering Faculty, pre-eminently. It is that which penetrates into the unseen worlds around us, the worlds of Science.”
– Ada Lovelace
I like to think that I can find the positives in (almost) any situation; for my own sanity, I certainly try to. While I do miss the clear skies, golden sunlit colours, and warmth of summer (and the time to enjoy them), I have a sneaking fondness for autumn. Yes, we’re knee-deep in the hardest term in the school year. Yes, I feel like I’ve been wading uphill, through treacle, while carrying a well-laden backpack and juggling flaming torches for the last seven weeks, but autumn has its perks.
There’s something very pleasant about getting out into the forest when it’s raining. Not the belting rain that renders you a cold, soggy heap within minutes, but the gently falling rain that seems to soften everything. I mean, yes, it softens the ground underfoot as well, but it takes away all the visual hard edges. If you’ve ever spent time in a wooded area, you know that what light there is can often be quite harsh, contrasting hugely with the shaded areas and creating permanent bars of light across your vision. In autumn, perhaps because so many leaves have fallen and allowed more light to penetrate, this contrast doesn’t seem so great. The colours of everything become warmer, become more harmonious, more homogenous.
I find it very odd that the bright, often vivid colours of autumn can blend together so well. There’s the bright gold of fallen Birch leaves, the orange and lime green of Beech, the mottled golden-green of Sweet Chestnut, the copper and brown of Oak, and the pinkish-red of Maple leaves echoed in the berries and haws of Hawthorn, Dog-Rose, Spindle and Holly. On the ground beneath the trees, fungus glimmer red, gold, orange, pink, purple, white, green and every shade of brown imaginable. Even the remaining flowers get in on the act; the deep golden yellow of the ever-present Gorse, the odd pink splash of the last Herb Robert, the white of Campion and the brighter yellow of tatty Dandelions and Hawkbits.
My favourite thing to photograph at this time of year (apart from the autumn foliage, obviously) is fungi. I find them endlessly fascinating. And utterly bewildering. I’m not going to pretend that I can identify them reliably. Or even unreliably sometimes. They come in such a huge array of forms, colours, and variations that I truly can’t imagine how one would go about becoming an expert. But they’re beautiful. They have such a range of forms, ranging from amorphous jelly to sculptural shapes. I’ve been taking pictures of them for years, and I still don’t feel like I’m repeating myself.
I quite often find that when I walk into an area of forest, I can see no fungal species. Nothing. Nary a one. And yet, when I’ve stood, crouched or even knelt there for a couple of minutes, I suddenly start to realise that I’m surrounded by different varieties. It’s like magic; they sidle out of the background like faeries revealing themselves in the old tales. One minute there’s nothing; the next, it’s like they’ve always been there.
Such was the case at Thompson Water this weekend. I’d followed a little side path down towards the waterside. The floor was littered with Birch leaves in a million shades of yellow and brown, their surfaces mottled and dotted and endlessly beautiful. I was looking for Candlesnuff Fungus (Spoiler alert: incoming post soon), which is rife in this area, and I’d been crouched down, my face just above the leaf litter, taking photos, when I suddenly realised that there was something else in my field of view. A thin, beige cylinder extended from the floor, almost exactly the same colour as the leaves surrounding it. I changed position, and it vanished, taking me several moments to relocate. I widened my search and found a couple of other individuals. Each one displayed an impressive (verging on supernatural) ability to disappear the moment I took my eyes off it.
Obviously, I had no idea what they were. I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen them before; given their ability to hide in plain sight, though, this comes as absolutely no surprise. I could have walked past a thicket of them and never had the faintest inkling they were there.
I’ve spent some quality time with my fungus identification book, and I think these are Pipe Club Fungus (Macrotyphula fistulosa). If they are (and its not a given!), they are apparently widespread and fairly frequent in Britain. See, hundreds of them, just hanging around, being invisible. Various accounts say they can grow up to 15cm long, waving in the slightest breeze, but these examples were, at most, about 8cm tall. They might be Slender Club Fungus (Typhula juncea), but I think they’re a bit too chunky.
Whichever they are, they’re saprophytic, meaning that they obtain their nutrients from the decaying wood on which they grow. Fungi that recycle nutrients are a vital part of any woodland ecosystem; without them, the world would be buried under all the fallen leaves/trees created every year.
Their current name comes from the Latin typhula, meaning ‘slightly smoky’ and fistulosa, which means ‘shaped like a pipe’. Proof that the scientists that named things were not creative writers, preferring instead to tell it like it is. They were originally named Clavaria fistulosa in 1790 but renamed in 2013. (Clavaria means ‘club’ in Latin)
“I try to stay in a constant state of confusion just because of the expression it leaves on my face.”
– Johnny Depp
You know how I had that fiasco with caterpillars that weren’t really caterpillars? Well, I just had a similar moment with a leech that wasn’t really a leech, and then wasn’t a slug either. This delightful (?) little creature is a Pear Slug Sawfly (Caliroa cerasi), feeding on a Hawthorn leaf.
These larvae are pests on commercial crops such as Cherry, Pear, and Plum trees. I’m not sure why this one was making do with Hawthorn, given that there were Crab Apple (Malussylvestris)* trees in the vicinity, but there it was.
* That sentence made perfect sense in my head, but is probably slightly less explanatory if you don’t know that Apple trees are in the same genus as Cherry, Pear, and Plum trees. Hawthorns are also in this genus, but to my mind, would be slightly less similar if you really wanted to eat a Cherry tree. Clearly, I don’t think like a Sawfly!!
I was actually looking for Shieldbugs but was intrigued enough by what appeared to be a leech in a tree to take a (cautious) closer look. The leech-like feel came from the fact that one end of this larvae is bulbous … it definitely reminded me of leeches when they are doing their creepy, stretchy-squishy thing.
On closer inspection, it was covered in a slimy mucus, making me veer towards a diagnosis of slug. The legs, however, made me think again. Something tickled the back of my mind; I’d read about Sawfly larvae being slug-like, hadn’t I?
Google agreed.
Apparently, that slimy mucus is to make the larvae unpalatable to predators. I can see how that would work. The larvae graze, like tiny slithery sheep, across the surface of leaves, leaving behind a characteristic skeletal leaf surface. They moult several times before they reach their final size and then drop to the ground, bury themselves in the substrate and pupate.
When the adult sawfly emerges, it allegedly climbs the tree on foot, mates, and lays eggs on the leaves. Given that the adult form clearly has wings (given that it’s a type of wasp), this seems slightly insane, but it’s the accepted narrative, so who am I to argue?
“My ducks are absolutely not in a row. I don’t even know where some of them are…. And I’m pretty sure one of them is a pigeon [flamingo].”
This may be the kind of funny saying that frequently appears on posters hung in people’s kitchen or workspaces, but in my classroom, it’s also disturbingly true:
I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned previously that I have a lot of toy ducks in my classroom, for …. reasons. This particular row of five* technically live on the base of my visualiser, although these days, they seem to spend very little time there.
I start every day with five ducks swimming happily in the calm, plastic waters of my visualiser base, and by break time, they are invariably missing in action. The game seems to be that the ducks have to be relocated to an alternate position in my classroom without me noticing. My job is then to find them and return them to their home. I’m not sure where this particular game came from; I think it may have been Kelis who started it, but whatever its origins, it has spread like wildfire. I’m pretty sure that there are now multiple players (perpetrators), and they are surprisingly good at it! Occasionally, I get given clues. Even more occasionally, they’re helpful clues.
I have found my wayward ducklings on pretty much every surface possible. They’ve been attached to the fire alarm siren, the WiFi box, the projector, the inside of my bookcase, my blinds, the laptop trolley and even the arm of my chair (I don’t want to talk about how I missed that one!) It took me longer than I care to admit to find the one stuck in the centre of the clock I glance at multiple times every lesson. The transluscent blue individual was ridiculously hard to see when attached to the blue poster of almost exactly the same colour.
We’ve got to the point that I can round up ducks while simultaneously answering questions, writing on the whiteboard, and maintaining order in my lesson. Hilariously, not one single student has even questioned me climbing on a chair to retrieve a small plastic duck from an elevated perch during a lesson. I don’t know whether to be horrified at their lack of curiosity, impressed by their acceptance of weirdness or slightly embarrassed that they seem to expect this kind of behaviour from me!
🦩🦩🦩
* Despite appearances, this is indeed a group of five ducks. For all one of them may appear to be a flamingo, it is, in actual fact, clearly a duck in a flamingo costume and not a flamingo pretending to be a duck. This is a long-running debate that is hotly contested amongst the ‘regulars’ in my room, but I remain adamant about its true identity.
🦩🦩🦩
I’ve got to admit, though, I appreciate the challenge of trying to keep track of the wildly wandering waterfowl. I enjoy the simplicity of this interaction with my students. It makes me happy that my little cherubs are willing to pit their wits against me in such a wholesome and child-like way. There isn’t anything worldly about this. They’re not trying to mimic something they’ve seen online. There’s no malice; it’s not antagonistic in any way. They’re just secretly relocating small, brightly coloured plastic ducks … and giggling when I can’t find them.
🦩🦩🦩
Update: I now have SIX ducks. I don’t know how (or even when) this happened, but a dark blue individual has appeared … seemingly out of nowhere. Are they breeding? Is this a winter migrant? Was it blown off course by an autumn storm? Is it a preternatural duck? Is it a flamingo wearing a duck costume?
“My hidebound boundary tree. My tree of knowledge. My thick-tapped, soft-fledged, airy listening post.”
– Seamus Heaney, ‘In The Beech’
I’ve spent many an hour this year peering into shrubs and trees, turning over branches, leaves, and flowers to find different species of shieldbug. So imagine my surprise when, walking past a large Beech tree this morning, I could immediately see a whole load of these itty bitty bugs just hanging out on its colourful leaves.
I stopped, I peered, I clicked.
Twelve tiny bugs, two species, on one tree, maybe four branches, photographed in less than five minutes.
All of that searching … and all I had to do was wait for autumn and walk past a Beech tree.
On the bright side, check out those gorgeous colours, just glowing in the sunshine. I love the way Beech trees take on the colours of autumn. First, one leaf starts to fade and lose its blue overtones. Its green becomes more and more yellowish until it turns a clear, vibrant gold. Then, the change starts to spread along a branch until the whole thing stands out from the rest of the tree. Gradually, all the branches jump on the bandwagon and, infinitesimally slowly, the tree as a whole turns a glorious golden colour before gaining a copper-bronze patina.
We’re getting there; autumn seems to be very slow this year, but it is happening.
“The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion that stands at the cradle of true art and true science.”
– Albert Einstein
The Nazca Lines are one of the most enduring mysteries in the world, baffling researchers for over eighty years. The geoglyphs cover a vast area (500 square km) of the Nazca Desert in the southern part of Peru. Some form geometric designs, while others are plants and animals, like spiders, monkeys, and hummingbirds.
The figures, some of which are several kilometres long, were carved into the desert floor over a period of a thousand years between 500BC and 500AD. How? How was that even possible? The lines are constructed on such a vast scale that their makers couldn’t have even seen them in their entirety. How did they accurately create such intricate designs? How did they even make both ends of a line join up, let alone maintain the integrity of the figures they were creating?
The lines have been studied since the 1920s, and yet, there are still no real answers. The Nazca Lines continue to amaze the people who are researching them. Scientists have found new figures as recently as 2020 (the advent of drones was a real bonus) and believe that there are still more to discover. There have been various theories about their purpose over the years, ranging from astronomical to ceremonial, but none has, as yet, been confirmed or even validated to any high degree.
The known facts are that we still don’t really know anything about them. Apart from the fact that they’re hauntingly beautiful and utterly fascinating. I read about them as a child and still have dreams of visiting them at some point (albeit dreams that fade slightly further with every passing year).
It makes me very happy that the echoes of Nazca have rippled all the way across the globe; every single time I find fallen trees, I find these same designs under their bark. The spiders*, monkeys, and hummingbirds might not seem like they belong in Norfolk, and yet here they are. The geometric lines, the spirals, are all completing their mysterious purpose, quietly, in the dark depths of the forest.
*I mean, do spiders really belong anywhere?
These complex pictographs are, of course, created by bark boring beetles going about their daily lives, feeding in (and on) the phloem of the trees.
But, at the risk of sounding disturbingly conspiracy theoristy (I promise I’m not really one of those sort of people), why do the feeding marks of beetles look so like the lines created by a civilisation halfway across the globe? Is it just a synchronicity of design? Or is this evidence that all living creatures are linked in some way? Do these designs come from a deeper subconscious? I can’t help feeling that, if we take this as a suggestion that all living organisms are linked, it might encourage people to start taking conservation seriously. If human beings have the same designs in their heads as wood-boring beetles, then destroying those beetles is an act of self-sabotage, right?
Or is it just that I believe in conservation? I believe that preserving the natural world is of the utmost importance, so I’m subject to confirmation bias. I’m entirely willing to accept that as a theory. (Probably more willing to accept that than accepting universal design principles, if I’m honest!)
🪲🪲🪲
Either which way, look at these gorgeous, intricate designs. Like cloudwatching on a summer’s day, you can see all sorts of pictures in them if you look. Butterflies. Eyes. Strands of DNA. Sea Stars.
absolutelynotnormal 