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.
