“All living things contain a measure of madness that moves them in strange, sometimes inexplicable ways.”
– Yann Martel, ‘Life of Pi’
Sometimes, the names of things are perfect. But sometimes, things are given names that just don’t quite sit right. This strange looking, almost alien creature is a common one in the UK. It crawls inexorably over things, forming a crust on their surface, swallowing them up like some insatiable monster. Even its colours are strange; a bright, pinkish-orange and a dusky greyish purple.
And yet, this weird, strange, fantastical creature is called the wrinkled crust.
Wrinkled crust. It creates images of something ancient, leathery, past its best. Something that’s on its way out. Something dusty, forgotten, sepia toned, and battered round the edges like an old daguerreotype. It just doesn’t fit.
Its Latin name is marginally better. Phlebia radiata*. Phlebia comes from the Greek ‘phleps’, meaning veins and radiata comes from the Latin ‘radius’ meaning ray. Put together, they describe this fungi’s habit of radiating out from a central point to form circular patches.
*That just took me three attempts to write each of the words; autocorrect would very much like to call it Phlebotomy radiation … stupid autocorrect!
It’s a resupinate (now there’s a good word) fungus, meaning that most parts of it are attached to the substrate, although its edges can remain free. The most notable thing about it, though, is that it’s unstoppable. If it meets an object when it’s expanding, it just keeps going; upwards, sideways, roundwards, downwards. Any surface is fair game. Which means it creates some pretty amazing shapes when it hits moss, pre-existing bracket fungi, or curls of bark.
So next time you’re out and about, keep an eye out for this brightly coloured critter … and marvel at just how incongruous and incompatible its name is.
“And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it.”
– Roald Dahl, ‘The Minpins’
Don’t you just love it when you’re looking at one thing and you notice something else equally awesome that you would never have seen if you weren’t looking at the first thing?
That was the case with this Earpick Fungus (Auriscalpium vulgare). The reason I was crouched down peering at the deep pile of pine needles was because I was checking whether there were any more clumps of the coral-ish (coral adjacent?) fungi from my last post loitering around. And yet, that’s not what I found …
When my eye fell on this brown, slightly hairy fungus cap, I knew instantly what it was. Despite being utterly inconspicuous and blending in beautifully to the forest floor, it was simultaneously incredibly obvious. Weird, huh? I’ve found this species a couple of times before, but both times, my first thought has been, “I wonder how many of these I’ve walked straight past and never noticed.” Obviously, I’ll never know, but I have visions of whole platoons of them lurking around behind pine trees, sniggering quietly at my inattention to detail.
These two were growing out of a pinecone that had been buried amongst the fallen needles. I gently brushed away the needles and extracted the pinecone. These little fellows seem to have more of a personality than some other species … they feel almost like furry little creatures crouching down in a hollow on the forest floor.
This mushroom, whose other names include (for obvious reasons) Pinecone Mushroom and Cone Tooth, is found on conifer litter or conifer cones, even if those cones appear buried at first sight. That wavy bordered cap is kidney shaped and the hairy stipe (stem) comes out of one side. The top of the cap is equally hairy and the bottom is covered in tiny white teeth, regularly arranged in rows. For all they’re not bright purple or orange, they remind me of those rubber stress balls … the spiky ones where the spikes ripple very satisfactorily when you squish them.
Not that I squished either of the fungus, just tucked the pinecone carefully back into the leaf litter and left them to quietly get on with life. There’s something reassuring about knowing that such special little creatures are present in our woodland.
“We only know a tiny proportion about the complexity of the natural world. Wherever you look, there are still things we don’t know about and don’t understand. There are always new things to find out if you go looking for them.”
– David Attenborough
Every so often, there’s a moment that makes you realise that nature likes to reuse good designs wherever possible. I don’t know if it’s just me, but this fungus looks awfully like a sponge … one of those natural ones that seem to be growing if you leave them on the edge of the bath.
Now, I have a bit of a confession here; I’m not entirely sure what this is. I mean, I know it’s not a sponge, that bit I am pretty certain of. But when it comes to putting a name to it, I’m a little bit stumped. I think it might be a Thelephora palmata. That’s what Google is telling me, and based on (some of) the photos I can find, it looks about right. Of course, some of the photos labelled with this species name look like a completely different species, but I guess that’s only to be expected when you use the internet!
The common name for this species is the Stinking Earthfan or Fetid False Coral. Given the particular epithets used in these names, it should come as no surprise that this fungus has a strong, garlic aroma. I’d love to tell you that I noticed this smell, but if I’m honest, I really didn’t. Irritatingly, my sense of smell, which used to be really sensitive, has never been the same since I caught Covid a few years ago. On the other hand, the more I read the descriptions of the smell, the more I might be quite glad I couldn’t smell it.
If I’ve got the species right, this is likely to be a young specimen as the tips were coated in white powder, whereas the rest of the mushroom were a greyish-purple.
I found it in an area of coniferous woodland to the West of Grimes Graves on my Saturday wander. I’d followed the route that has been marked out for an upcoming bike event in the forest but then branched off when it started heading too far away from where I wanted to be. The books and websites all say that this is associated with coniferous areas, often close to birch trees (which were also not far away from where I found this), but there are very few confirmed sightings in the UK and the closest one is way over towards Stanton. The photos make this look surprisingly like Candlesnuff Fungus, but it was much softer and had a more pinkish/lilac tinge in real life.
If by some miracle someone well informed sees this post and has some input, I’d be very grateful to receive it.
“Live in each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influence of the earth.”
– Henry David Thoreau, ‘Walden or, Life in the Woods’
Last week, I went a Sunday wander through Thompson Water. Not literally, before you giggle too much! The reserve is lovely at this time of year, with large areas of deciduous woodland turning golden and copper in the sunshine, seasonal ponds surrounded by phragmites and hemp agrimony. It was somewhat spoiled by the absolute buffoon of a man, friend in tow, who had three dogs with them, all off their leads (despite copious signage to the contrary), all with large bells on their collars and one of them actually chasing a deer around. I may not like muntjac very much, but that was so far beyond the pale as to not even be able to see the pale! Unfortunately, I didn’t feel able to remonstrate the way I wanted to … even I’m not daft enough to challenge two idiots that are considerably bigger than me and three dogs in an area with no witnesses.
Anyway, having poked around in the leaf litter next to the water for a while … and found no sign of the pipe clubs, although I did find some rather lovely Russula spp … I took the longer path through to the other end of the reserve. The path winds under the canopies of beech and hazel trees, and what sounded like a horde of invading barbarians rustled busily in the undergrowth. It always amazes me quite how much noise squirrels can make, despite being barely bigger than my hand.
As I walked, I was trying to remember how long it had been since I went that way. Oddly, I always seem to take the other path; irritatingly, it’s the one more travelled by, so I couldn’t even quote Frost at myself. It’s been a while, but as I followed a particularly twisty bit of path through a holly thicket, I had a vivid memory of one year when it had rained enough to make the path unnavigable.
***
Some enterprising (and apparently optimistic) soul had laid down a thick mat of branches in the mud, but they’d sunk just enough to make the way even more slippery. Weighing up my options, I chose to follow an elephant path through a couple of holly bushes rather than risking the normal route.
As I climbed over a fallen log, I noticed a small cluster of almost colourless fungus cups with furry exterior surfaces nestled into the rotting wood. I’m still not entirely sure what exactly they were, it’s possible they were the wonderfully named Hairy Fairy Cup (Humaria hemisphaerica) but as with all my fungal identifications, this needs to be taken with a very large spoonful of salt.
I looked it up … it was apparently 2017 when I saw it first! This is my original photo.
***
Every time I pass by this way, I feel the need to stop and look at the same log, just to see whether it’s there again. I’ve actually found it a couple of times, but this was not one of them. Instead, I was briefly sidetracked by some pleasingly bulbous mushrooms (possibly some kind of Honey Fungus) growing from underneath the log.
But then, as I was giving in to the demands of my knees to not stay crouched down, I noticed this tiny little chip of wood that seemed to have some tiny passengers. This whole piece of wood was about an inch long, and the fungus cups were about 3mm across*. It took me a while to organise my knees into a comfortable and stable position in order to get close enough to take photos.
*Yes, I just mixed metric and imperial measurements …. no, I’m not even sorry. Too many years working with, and translating for, builders mean that my brain bounces between both systems indiscriminately.
On closer inspection, the amorphous blobs of black turned out to be defined discs of black rubber, each with a short stem and what looks like a slightly fuzzy external surface. These are, I think (the usual provisos apply), Black Jelly Drops (Bulgariainquinans), otherwise known as Poor Man’s Liquorice, Black Bulgar, Gum Mushroom, Bachelor Buttons, or Rubber Buttons.
Despite the liquorice based name, they’re not classed as edible. I mean, even if they were a liquorice substitute, I would absolutely declare their inedibility given that as far as I’m concerned, liquorice is the food of the devil!!
This fungus grows on dead or dying hardwoods, often sweet chestnut, oak or ash, breaking it down and recycling nutrients. If you touch them, they can stain your fingers and cause skin irritation, especially in the sunshine. Glad I didn’t poke around too much! The Latin species name ‘inquinans‘ means polluting, befouling, or staining to honour this characteristic.
“Decline is also a form of voluptuousness, just like growth. Autumn is just as sensual as springtime. There is as much greatness in dying as in procreation.”
– Yvan Goll
I love autumn. I love it for its colours, its smells, its sounds, and for its moments of deterioration. There’s something really special about stumbling* upon the tiny details that make up this season.
*hopefully not literally!
It wasn’t the best of autumn days this morning: a bit grey, no sunshine, and a definite hint of moisture in the air, but I set off for a woodland wander nevertheless. This is the time of year when I have to choose my destination carefully. So much of my local forest is coniferous, and too much time spent under a needled canopy means that I miss the colours on display elsewhere. On the other hand, deciduous forest has a richer understorey which holds more water … which can make for some very soggy feet!
Today, I headed for Hockham Woods, which usually has some great colour on its beeches and hornbeams. It’s always a good location for ‘shrooms as well. There were only a few cars parked, which is always a good sign … I don’t want company on my walks; I like to womble around, peering closely at the things I pass and taking photos. I made my way through the woods to the stile into the wilder bit. Climbing over, I fought my way through the bracken, which is shoulder high, and shows no sign, apart from a change in colour from deep green to bronze, of admitting that autumn is here. I followed the narrow, winding path past a row of glorious hornbeams, their curled, matte bronze leaves crunching underfoot. The relentless tapping of what I can only assume was a woodpecker echoed through the trees. High above me, the plaintiff kee-ing of a buzzard drew my attention skywards at intervals.
There’s often a herd of Highland Cows roaming this area, but they were conspicuous in their absence today. The harsh croaking of a jay came from the canopy, warning everything in the vicinity of my presence. Not that the deer took any notice, breaking cover only as I passed them and drumming away to find another spot.
The next bit I walked through was an area that had been almost clearcut. Only a few broadleaf trees remained, and great piles of cut timber lined the track, each with its requisite signs to tell me not to climb on them as “rolling logs can kill.” I briefly wonder who on earth would climb on them and then, considering what I know about ‘The Public’, accept that the signs are necessary and continue on.
My attention is captured by the hoards of small, brown, uninspiring fungi, marching steadily across the newly empty landscape. Clearly, they take their job of cleaning up the mounds of woodchips left by the forestry workers very seriously. Suddenly, I notice a small enclave of something different.
Amongst the drab brown work overalls the hoi polloi, these individuals are sporting fancy black and white pinstripes. I’m pretty sure they are a Coprinopsis spp. I think they’re Hare’s Foot Inkcaps (Coprinopsis lagopus). So named after the soft, white, almost furry appearance of the young fungi, I can’t help but feel that the person responsible for this name missed a fairly major trick.
Because it’s only in decay that this beautiful fungus comes into its own. As the fruiting body begins to senesce, the edges of its gills mature and get darker and darker, creating a pinstriped effect. The cap begins to draw backwards, rolling up at the edges, bending and twisting these dark lines into closely parallel waves reminiscent of Bridget Riley paintings. As this is happening, the cap begins to sag on its stipe, turning downwards and showing off the patterns to their best advantage. The gills deliquesce** from the edges of the cap inwards until the whole fungus dissolves into black ink. This means the mushroom dissolves its cells into liquid using its own enzymes. This helps distribute the spores present in the gills. The entire lifecycle of the fungus is completed within about twenty-four hours.
**Isn’t that such a delightfully evocative word? You can almost feel it dissolving in your mouth as you pronounce it.
“Elves are wonderful. They provoke wonder. Elves are marvellous. They cause marvels. Elves are fantastic. They create fantasies. Elves are glamorous. They project glamour. Elves are enchanting. They weave enchantment. Elves are terrific. They beget terror. The thing about words is that meanings can twist just like a snake, and if you want to find snakes look for them behind words that have changed their meaning. No one ever said elves are nice. Elves are bad.”
– Terry Pratchett, ‘Lords and Ladies’
It was a quick walk, a circular route, along the path past Thompson and then back past the highland coo field and the church. More about stretching our legs and seeing some daylight than actually finding things. Daylight is a luxury, you see, something that I don’t see very often at this time of year; I’m still walking to work in the grey light of dawn and home in the dark. But it’s half term, so I can indulge in sunshine (when the weather is on my side). I’ve had my two days of lying on the sofa and vegetating with a heated blanket, a book, and some tut TV, and now I’m ready to brave the world again.
So here we were.
The path was rather more muddy than expected, and the wind was bitingly cold as we set off from the car. Nevertheless, spring was clearly beginning to at least consider springing. The Hazel trees were adorned with fat, wibbly catkins, shockingly yellow-green against the still overwhelmingly brown landscape*. Mum is convinced she’s read somewhere that they’re edible, but I can’t help feeling that they’d be bitty when raw and disturbingly caterpillary if cooked 🤢. Green shoots of vegetation were just starting to show amongst the dead grass stems. Pussy Willow buds were beginning to break out into fluffy, silvery blobs. Lords and Ladies with their purple splotched green leaves provoked a conversation about whether they were a different species to the ones that have plain green leaves (and as I type that I realise I never did look up the answer).
*If you’ve never been to Norfolk in winter, you’ll never even begin to understand just how monotonously brown it can be!
And then something caught my eye; a tiny flash of vivid scarlet, nestled into the grass. And another, and another, and another. These are Scarlet Elfcups Sarcoscypha austriaca (or maybe Ruby Elfcups, but given that the difference can only be seen in the coiled or uncollected nature of the fine hairs that make up the outer surface and can only be seen under a microscope, I’m resigned to the fact that we’ll never know for sure!), otherwise known as Scarlet Elf Caps, Red cups, Scarlet cups, Moss Cups or Fairies’ Baths.
They’re saprophytic, growing on fallen dead wood, often Hazel, Elm and Willow (these ones were on a fallen Hazel branch), and although they often look like they’re growing directly from the substrate, in reality they have a short stipe or stem. If you look at the last photo of the teeny, tiny individual, you can see this white stem quite clearly.
Weirdly, for something that is just as vividly, almost unnaturally, red, as these photos make them look, they are remarkably difficult to spot. If you see one and then take your eye off it, it disappears. To me, this is maybe why they were associated with elves! Although, in actual fact, the association seems to be more centred around the fact that in European folklore, woodland elves were said to drink the morning dew from them. Because why wouldn’t they?
Despite the fact that many sources state they are inedible, they can, in fact, be eaten. Although one source I swear I found (but now cannot locate) stated that they have a texture “quite unlike what you expect from a mushroom,” which doesn’t really make them seem appetising! I think I’ll be leaving them right where I found them.
Just as one last interesting fact, the Oneida tribe in the US used to use them to stop bleeding and apparently bound them to the navels of newborns to promote healing. So if you’re ever bleeding in the woods and a bit peckish, these could be the answer to all your prayers.
Until then, enjoy their vivid colour and take them as a sign that spring is springing.
“Sing a song of seasons! Something bright in all! Flowers in the summer, Fires in the fall!“
– Robert Louis Stevenson, ‘Autumn Fires‘
This is Tinder Fungus. Or Tinder Polypore. Or Hoof Fungus. Or Iceman Conk (for reasons which I’ll explain in a moment). Or Fomes fomentarius for the more scientific amongst us. It grows on dead or dying hardwood species across the globe, from Dominica in the Caribbean to North America, from Japan to Iran and Turkey. In the UK, its host is primarily birch, but also occasionally beech and sycamore. It starts off life as a parasitic species, entering the tree through damaged bark or broken branches. Once the tree dies, it then becomes saprophytic, breaking down the wood and recycling its nutrients. The fruiting bodies are perennial and can survive for up to thirty years! It’s a polypore fungus and, as such, has pores on its underside rather than gills.
It is not an edible species. If you’ve ever found these, you’ll know that saying they’re solid is somewhat of an understatement. But that doesn’t mean that it’s of no use to humans. Because the fibrous inner flesh of these fruiting bodies burns slowly, it’s ideal for use as tinder.
In 1991, hikers found the mummified body of a man in the Ötztal Alps. Nicknamed Ötzi, radiocarbon dating established that the man was alive in 3300 BC, dating him to the Chalcolithic period (Copper Age). X-Ray analysis in 2001 showed that he had been shot with an arrow in the shoulder and also had significant head trauma; he had likely bled to death. In a detailed study in 2012, the arrow wound was confirmed as the cause of death. Alongside Ötzi, archaeologists also found a leather pouch containing a tinder fungus, a scraper, a boring tool, a bone awl, and a flint flake. It fascinates me that we can identify a fungus to species level, even after over 5000 years. The existence of the fungus in Ötzi’s pouch was obviously the origin of the name Iceman Conk.
I find this all the time on my walks; it’s not at all uncommon. These ones were on a Sunday wander through Cranberry Rough. The muddy, leaf strewn pathway of the Great Eastern Pingo Trail runs between large areas of birch woodland, studded with shallow pools. Trees lie where they’ve fallen, gradually falling apart and returning to the earth. Bracken obscures the earth in patches. The colours are autumnal in the extreme; oranges, bronzes, and subtle shades of brown. Even the hollies are bejewelled in ruby red at this time of year. There are no pathways leading into the reserve itself, just the one I’m on tunnelling through the undergrowth. Fungi are scattered over the floor in drifts, ochre yellow, burnt sienna, and amethyst.
Birch trees lie supine, their streaky cream and grey bark staying solid, long after the wood inside has turned to damp piles of dust. Moss straggles messily along the tops of branches, fence posts, and tree stumps. Protruding from some of the logs are irregular shapes in a dusty, purplish brown. These are Tinder Fungus. Like the hooves of some twisted mythical creature, they have a gnarled upper surface, cracked and unkempt. The growth rings are obvious and irregular. The newer growth is paler; cream, and pale ochre taking the place of grey and purple. On the lower surface, circular indentations pock the velvety texture, ringed with a denser white border.
“Think of every fairy-tale villainess you’ve ever heard of. Think of the wicked witches, the evil queens, the mad enchantresses. Think of the alluring sirens, the hungry ogresses, the savage she-beasts. Think of them and remember that somewhere, sometime, they’ve all been real.
Mab gave them lessons.”
– Jim Butcher, ‘Small Favour’
Across the world, different species of fungi are frequently associated with the supernatural. But why is this the case? What is it that makes people look at mushrooms and think, “Hmm, must be associated with tiny, mythical beings from another world?”
I can sort of understand how a perfect ring of mushrooms, the faerie ring of legend, could be interpreted as something mysterious. I mean, if you didn’t understand the spread of hyphae from a central point, you wouldn’t be able to grasp how nature could possibly produce such a perfect circle. There are many different variations of the legends. In Celtic folklore, these circles of mushrooms were believed to be the product of faeries and elves dancing in a circle. Any human who dared to step inside the ring would be punished for their audacity by being compelled to dance until they collapsed from exhaustion or died. Germanic lore, however, proposed that these Hexenringe (Witches Rings) were created by witches dancing on Walpurgisnacht (30th April … exactly six months before All Hallow’s Eve), whereas the Austrians believed that dragons had burned the rings into the forest floor with their tails. The French also believed that they were caused by witches, calling them Ronds de Sorcières and imagining great toads with bulging eyes appearing inside them.
If you think of a Fly Agaric (Amanitamuscaria), the chances are that you will be picturing it with a tiny chimney, windows, and a door. They have been portrayed as pixie houses so often that the two things are linked almost inextricably. But why? Did this originate solely in Victorian paintings (such as The Intruder by John Anster Fitzgerald in 1860)? Does it have its roots in the psychotropic properties of the mushroom itself? In Slavic mythology, the Fly Agaric is linked with Veles, the God of earth, water, forests, and the underworld. Veles was thought to give the mushroom as a gift to humans. Although given that it is mildly poisonous, causing stomach cramps and hallucinations, the gift would be a literal poisoned chalice! In Viking lore, the Fly Agaric originated from red flecks of foam that fell from the mouth of Sleipnir, Woton’s six-legged steed as he was pursued by devils. Perhaps these divine associations come directly from the mushroom’s hallucinogenic properties and its ability to enable its consumer to ‘talk to the Gods’. But that still doesn’t explain the mushroom’s frequent depiction as the abode of tiny winged faeries. If anyone knows where this comes from, please do share.
Another mythically named fungus I’ve found frequently in the past (although usually slightly later in the year, so I have no recent photos) is the Scarlet Elf Cup (Sarcoscypha austriaca). This bright red, cup shaped fungus was thought to be the vessel from which Wood Elves drank the morning dew.
I’m pretty sure I have also found Dryad’s Saddle (Cerioporus squamosus) in the past and will be paying a little more attention to our local polypores in the future to find it again. The name clearly points to the myth that dryads, or tree nymphs, could ride these fungi.
This week’s find, the thing that sparked my quick ramble through folklore and fungi, mushrooms and mythology, was these little yellow discs that were growing on a rotting beech stump. I believe, and as always, we are taking this with a hefty pinch of salt, that these are Yellow Fairy Cups (Bisporella citrina). All I can say is that, if they’re drinking out of these, faeries are clearly not very thirsty! There’s not a lot of ‘cup’ in them*. They formed shockingly golden streaks against the lime green of the moss and the deep brown of the soggy wooden substrate, a fungal counterpart to the gold of the beech keaves in the canopy.
* Which probably means I’ve identified them wrong, and they’re actually something completely different, but for now, they fulfil all the expected criteria, so this is what I’m going with.
“For a word to be spoken, there must be silence. Before, and after.”
– Ursula K. Le Guin, A Wizard of Earth
Is it just me, or do you sometimes get an idea in your head that just keeps on circling around and popping back up repeatedly? It happens to me …. a lot. And then I start relating that central idea to all the other things that are going on at the time (usually without meaning to) and then it starts to feel like the whole world is tangled together into one big knot. I mean, yes, everything is connected tangentially, but maybe not quite as connected as I sometimes make it!
This time, I’ve been thinking a lot about silence. As a teacher, silence is a double-edged sword. Of course, I want students to stay silent when they’re working hard and concentrating; at those points, there’s nothing worse than constant little whispers and giggles. Conversely, if you’ve ever asked students a question (especially in front of an observer), and faced a room full of complete, total silence, you’ll know that it’s really not always a blessing! On those occasions, you’d sell your soul for someone to give you just one sensible answer. Or even a not sensible answer. Just an answer. Anything.
Last Monday, I had a really tough lesson with my ‘interesting’ Year 10 group and was desperate for some semblance of silence after an hour of them shouting out random words at intervals, turning round and conducting whole conversations after being asked to write a paragraph, and generally being a pain in the butt. By the end of the hour, I didn’t know whether to retreat under my desk and cry or just walk out. Of my classroom. Of school. Of the profession. I’m not sure I cared which. Don’t worry, the impulse wore off and I made coffee instead. Lots and lots of coffee!
Then, the same day, I read an article about the use of silence in teaching poetry. Which, on the surface of it, is an odd idea. We tend to think about teaching poetry as being all about words. The words the poet has chosen, the words we use to explain things to the students, the words they use to give an analysis of what they’ve read. But the author was talking about the way in which silence can be used to give students thinking time, rather than expecting them to be able to formulate their ideas instantly. He mentioned using a pregnant pause to encourage deep thinking rather than a facile answer. He explained that once he had mastered the art of silence, an unexpected, added bonus was that students listened more intently when he broke that silence. I shared the article with a colleague with whom I’d been discussing how we teach poetry. She was as intrigued as I was. I’m not sure I have any answers yet, but it’s given me food for thought.
The next link in the chain was the idea of needing silence. Anyone who has a job that involves people knows that sometimes you just need people to stop talking. You get home and just want to sit in a quiet room, maybe with a book and a large glass of wine. And yet silence is really hard to find. There are always fireworks being set off (England in November is a wonderful place, despite the fact that children don’t seem to ‘Remember, remember the fifth of November’ any longer*, cars being driven around with very loud exhaust pipes, sirens, and (as last night) very loud (probably drunk) people outside the pub.
* For any non-English readers, this is a reference to the Gunpowder Plot of 1605, a failed conspiracy by Guy Fawkes and his cronies to blow up Parliament and the reigning king (James I), and the reason for our celebration of Bonfire Night on the fifth of November, with its burning of Guy Fawkes’ effigies, fireworks (symbolic of the proposed explosion), and goodies (as a Yorkshire girl, I firmly believe there is no better seasonal cake than Yorkshire Parkin!).
Walking on Sunday morning, I was acutely conscious of two things: how much noise I was making and how much noise there was in the forest around me. Now, I know the forest is never silent, but it seemed to be particularly full of rustlings and squeakings this morning. Squirrels were busily running through the leaf litter and dancing across the sylvan highways above me. Jays were croaking hoarsely at me from the treeline. Long-tailed tits twittered and peeped from the undergrowth. Chestnut leaves pattered down to the forest floor from increasingly bare branches, sounding oddly like a sudden rain shower.
And then I found these wonderful, ear-shaped fungi. Perfectly designed to listen to the sounds of the forest around them. These are Jelly Ear fungus, Auricularia auricula-judae. Otherwise known as Wood Ear or Jew’s Ear. They are usually found on Elder trees (as these were), and the name Jew’s Ear comes from the belief that Judas Escariot hanged himself from an Elder tree.
They are not only flesh coloured but also have a fleshy texture, a faintly downy surface that is eerily reminiscent of skin and an obviously ear-shaped form. The fungus bible optimistically tells me they’re edible, but I cannot imagine wanting to eat something so disturbingly like human flesh!!
Perhaps the sounds of the forest can replace silence in our world. Perhaps they are the ‘silence’ we need to counteract the sound of human society. Perhaps these mushrooms are a hint from the universe that we should spend more time in silence, just listening to what the world around us has to say.
“He found himself wondering at times, especially in the autumn, about the wild lands, and strange visions of mountains that he had never seen came into his dreams.”
– J.R.R. Tolkien, ‘The Lord of The Rings’
The road over to Santon Downham is lined with trees. Along the Thetford road, it’s mostly Sycamores with their rusty leaves looking mottled and dead, interspersed with a very occasional fiery Beech and the ubiquitous Scots and Corsica Pines towering behind. Once you turn on to the side road, though, it truly starts to feel like autumn. The colours start to intensify; the gorgeous oranges, yellows, coppers, and lime green of the Beeches, the startling yellow kaleidoscope of the Black Walnuts, and the mellow gold of the Silver Birches. Branches stretch across the road, high above my head, creating a tunnel lit with a fiery intensity. It’s a narrow road, this one, and really needs more attention than I’m sparing right now. I drag my mind back to the mechanics of moving safely through this fairytale landscape and reach my goal without incident.
The carpark entrance has been drastically narrowed since I last came over. I half-heartedly wonder why, but really, it doesn’t matter; whatever the reason, it’s had the bonus effect of reducing the number of visitors. I could park anywhere, but I always like to take advantage of the beechy canopy at one end. There’s something about parking under these giants, next to the sturdy trunks bearing numerous carved messages. Who knows how old the initials are. They’re probably quite recent, but in my head, they’re a link to the past. Beech masts crunch dully under my feet as I change my footwear and head up to the path.
The path follows along the side of the railway for the first stretch, and it always surprises me how many trains run along it. There are lots of fungi here; sun-bleached Amanita muscaria, well nibbled Russula sp. (aren’t they always well nibbled?), and lots and lots of beige ones, in different sizes, of indeterminate (to me at least) species.
As I walk, I remember poking around in the leaf litter in this area one year (as you do), only to be given a very long and disapproving lecture by a passing dog walker about how there were Death Caps (Amanita phalloides) in the area and it was far too dangerous to go near them and they should all be destroyed instantly. (I’m not entirely sure what she thought they were going to do if not extirpated on sight, but she was definitely rabid about them.) I protested that I was only taking photos and had absolutely zero intention of ingesting anything I found in the forest; I am, if nothing else, incredibly realistic about my lack of ability to identify fungi reliably! She was not appeased. I eventually made my escape and continued on my way … still taking photos. This, this is why I avoid people like the plague when I’m out walking.
I reach the place where the path divides and take a moment to make a decision. Do I head further along the valley, cross the river, and make my way back through the forestry plantation on the other side? Or should I turn up by Blood Hill barrow and along the top path? I choose the latter, but the barrow seems to have vanished into the bracken; I remember it being much more visible in the past, but perhaps they’ve let the bracken take over in an attempt to protect it from too many visitors. It’s a Bronze Age burial mound, one of many round here, that was given scheduled monument status in 1927. There’s not a lot to see, though, just one more lump in a very lumpy bit of the world.
I get sidetracked by an area where the fallen fir cones seem to have all been colonised by prolific crops of tiny, fragile, white mushrooms. Strobilurus trullisatus (the imaginatively named Fir Cone Mushroom), maybe? Despite being endemic to the Pacific North West, the maps seem to suggest it grows here in Thetford Forest as well.
The big Beeches at the top have the usual crop of bright purple Amethyst Deceivers around their feet, half buried in the drifts of copper leaves, and some rather lovely powdery orange lichen (Trentepohlia sp?) on the fallen branches. I tear myself away and carry on.
Having worked my way almost back to the road, I cut down towards the carpark on one of the tiny bike tracks that run all the way through this forest. Luckily, there are no mad bikers today, and I have it all to myself. I love the way this forest is divided into patches, and the vegetation changes so much with each one. I move through an area of Beech, crunching my way through deep drifts of fallen leaves, kicking them up in front of me, just for the joy of it. The floor is studded with pinkish-red Russula sp., each one with numerous bites taken out of it, almost as if tiny estate agents were trying to fashion them into Fly Agaric (Amanita muscaria) in an attempt to attract pixie tenants.
The next patch is an area of Scots Pine; it seems more open at ground level, but the light is greyer somehow. It almost seems misty, even though dawn was long ago and the day is dry. The path is slippery beneath my feet, pine needles don’t provide much traction, even to hiking boots. It’s oddly hushed in this dim space, and every sound seems muffled and distant. Suddenly, my attention is caught by a scrap of bright orange by the side of the path. It feels out of place, and I despair at people who just discard their rubbish in natural areas. I look closer and realise it’s not rubbish at all.
I’ve read about this fungus, but never seen it before. I honestly thought someone had dropped chunks of orange plastic! This is Orange Peel Fungus (Aleuria aurantia). It likes to grow in disturbed soil, which explains its presence along the side of my path. It is apparently edible, but I can tell you that it really doesn’t look at all appetising. Having said that, something was obviously hungry enough to have a fairly sustained nibble.
In the past, this species have always been classified as saprobic, meaning that they rot wood but it is now increasingly being thought of as mycorrhizal, which means that it (may) has a symbiotic relationship with the trees around it. If this is the case, its hyphae surround the tree rootlets with a sheath (called a mycorrhiza), and it can then help the tree absorb water and nutrients while the tree provides it with sugars and amino acids. It’s this kind of mycelial network that trees can use to pass nutrients to each other in times of need, a fact that always makes me feel very happy.
It might look like human detritus, but it’s actually a vital part of the forest ecosystem.
absolutelynotnormal 