The clocks went back an hour last weekend, heralding dark mornings and dark drives home again for the next six months. It always feels like it will be an eternity before spring starts to brighten our lives again. If that wasn’t enough to dampen our spirits, it looks like we might be heading for another general lockdown again. During these trying times, my levels of anxiety have really ramped up and visits to the woods have been a welcome relief. I hope I shall still be able to visit.

I’ve been planning to extend my shelter area to incorporate a blacksmithing section using a big plastic tarp. It’s not my ideal solution as it will look intrusive but I already have the tarp and long branches for supports, so I might as well have a crack at it. If I don’t like it, all I have lost is my time and effort. Yesterday’s visit was to start building and experimenting . The idea is to lash poles to the alongside the shelter to anchor the tarp. Two sides are easy enough, using existing trees but I’m not entirely sure how the other two will work. I got the two long support poles up and spent a long time trying the tarp to see how it would fit. It took up the most part of the day and at the end of it, there was little to show for my efforts and I felt a bit downhearted. I had hoped to have the tarp up. It really needs some more eyelets fitting to it to anchor it securel. I ran out of inspiration and energy to work out how I am going to support the other to sides. It looks like I will have a month to think about it if we go into lockdown again. Hmm is that a positive or a negative element?

The woods are very Autumnal now, many trees are bare or will be soon. My favourite trees are Beech. They are so elegant with their smooth trunks and relatively slender branches. In Spring, the new leaves are a beautiful lime green but Autumn is the time when they really look their best. As the leaves turn colour, you will see many different hues all at the same time, yellows, rusts and some still pale green ones. I have some nice specimens, here’s a few photos.

That’s about all I can tell you this time. The pandemic situation is worrying, scary and we live in very uncertain times. It’s hard to feel positive about life and I know many of you will feel the same way. Once again, my advice is to engage with nature as much as you can. It’s an amazing awe-inspiring place to be and for the time you are there, you can forget the craziness. Best wishes to you all.

A dark drizzly morning on my way to meet a good friend at my woods yesterday but it soon cleared up and turned into a mild sunny day. Occasionally a gust of wind blew up, sending autumn leaves showering down, quite magical. It’s very noticeable how much the daylight hours are shortening now though. This weekend we will turn the clocks back an hour. It’s a significant marker in the year for me and one that tends to fill me with some sadness. I don’t like the dark mornings – and nights especially. It signifies the end of the growing season and a long haul ahead before nature springs back to life. At this time with the rising levels of Covid19, it’s even more depressing.

But we have to try to find some strength and positivity in our lives. Owning these woods is a definite life saver for me. I’ve said it many times, spending time in nature is the best medicine for mental health as well as physical. I never fail to appreciate what I have as a small woodland owner. I feel very privileged because I can spend quality time there without restrictions. I can light a fire, camp, build useful features to enhance the woods or just wander around undisturbed, observing and taking photos. Not many people have this facility but you can still get huge benefits from just visiting your local woodlands and spending time there, ensconced in nature.

My pal feels exactly the same way about it and so I had invited him along to spend the day with me. I had a couple of small jobs to tackle but mainly I wanted to just enjoy the woods and do some fungi foraging together. I don’t think there are many edible species there but we found plenty of other small varieties to look at and try to identify.

I think these gorgeous fungi are Porcelain Fungi.

The first job was to move a pile of logs that were stacked by the side of my shelter. I’m planning to extend the shelter to create a work area for blacksmithing and the log pile was in the way. We soon had it sorted and the area is looking good and ready to start building. It will be a simple affair, a large clear tarp with one edge fastened to a spar above the shelter, then somehow drawn out towards the camera position and supported with more log poles and ropes. It’s still a bit experimental and may not be the final plan.

After lunch it was time for fungi foraging. Didn’t need to go far to find a host of different ones growing around a brash hedge I built a few years ago. It really brings home the benefits to the woods, not only providing shelter and nesting sites for small birds, mice, frogs and toads; as the wood rots it provides nourishment for the fungi which break down and feed the earth. Here’s a few photos of what we found, I haven’t had time to ID them all though. This one grows on dead wood, is tiny and called Candlesnuff and Stag’s Horn fungi.

I think these are called Stump Puffball and are edible when young.

No idea what these are. Small, flat and wavy growing in a crevice of a rotting trunk.

And these are just growing profusely around old wood debris. I think they are Glistening Inkcap

Finally this is the one I found last week on a dead birch. Could it be Oyster Mushroom? I hope so and look forward to some more.

It was a great day and we started making plans for more mini adventures. So far I have missed out on camping due to lockdown restrictions and lack of motivation but a few late evening stays to sit around a camp fire in the dark and cook a meal would be good. A visit to my pal’s woods to do some woodwork craft is also a possibility. Take care all of you.

Yesterday’s weather looked a bit “iffy” but as it is two weeks since my last visit and there were jobs to be done, I decided to go anyway. As it happened, it stayed dry. It had a real feel of Autumn about it and as you will see, various fungi are emerging. The ones above are referred to as Turkey Tails though there are many variations of actual types.

I had a few jobs in mind, first was to cut a couple of slices off a hefty sycamore trunk that I felled last winter. It was a badly damaged and unsafe tree and I’d left it untouched as it is too useful to just be cut up for firewood. One of the slices will be used to stand my anvil on that I recently bought.

I spent most of the morning shifting logs to the ride edge, ready for removal. Heavy, tiring work for an ageing body but very satisfying. I took a welcome break to have a walkabout and see what was new. I got quite excited when I spotted this Fly Agaric (Amanita Muscaria) growing under a Birch tree. It’s the first time I have found any in my woods and there were four of them. They are highly toxic and can cause hallucinations if ingested. These are the mushrooms often associated with the Faeries in childrens’ stories.

One of my woodland neighbours called by. He’s a keen bushcrafter and nature lover and we had a good long catch-up and tour of my woods. Naturally the subject of Covid was discussed at length but we both agreed that having our woods was the best medicine for our mental well-being. It was on our wanderings that he spotted this next beautiful fungi. I haven’t ID’d it yet. It was growing on a dead Silver Birch.

As I had brought my chainsaw, I wanted to break the ice with this season’s sycamore thinning. There is still quite a lot of work to be done in getting this part of my woods to a state that I am happy with. I am acutely aware that my age is a restriction on how much I can achieve in the time I have and level of fitness. So I need to crack on with it over the next few years. The season for felling seems to whizz by and I always think to myself, I should start earlier. I picked a small diameter one, which as is often the case, got hung up in another tree. I bit of hammering and pulling soon released it and I quickly cut it into manageable lengths. The day was getting late to do any more and to be honest – I was knackered!

It was a satisfying day and before long we will see the Autumn fully kicking in. Some trees are starting to turn colour and fall and a few are already bare (the Ash). There is still lots of greenery though and even new growth on the ground where I strimmed back the bramble. I’m quite looking forward to seeing some real winter conditions this year but global warming will probably prevent that.