I visited again yesterday, mainly to take some things and bring back some logs. I had some wooden pallets and an old garden seat to take and as we have just had a wood burning stove fitted at home, am trying to build up a store of logs for the winter. I haven’t got my felling licence yet so can only cut dead or diseased trees. There are a number of dead ones standing in the sycamore compartment and because they are upright, are relatively well seasoned and dry already. They are small trees and therefor easy to fell and cut up with a bowsaw. Here’s one I cut.

Now, about the title of this post. I spotted a large round hole in the earth, a few inches deep. It was fresh and looked like a badger had made it. I went over to get a closer look and spotted two squirming masses in the bottom, about the size of an apple. I had no idea what they were so moved closer to find out. I realised they were swarms of hornets which presumably had been disturbed by the mystery digger. Normally, my curiosity would have kept me there to watch and take photos. One of my woodland neighbours had mentioned how he accidentally shredded a nest of them while using his brush-cutter. He was attacked by a large number of them and got stung about 30 times and was very frightened at the time. This warning and the fact that they were starting to take flight in my direction, prompted me to leg-it as fast as I could. I ran back and jumped in the car for safety. I felt a sharp pain in my lower back and discovered one of the little critters had climbed down the waistband on my trousers and managed to sting me three times before I snuffed it out. I think I escaped lightly there.

I found these pretty little mushrooms growing. Haven’t identified them yet but couldn’t resist posting a photo of them.