You might have seen the photo I posted for the #2020picoftheweek challenge. But if not… here’s another chance. Fungi and Lichen on a heathland gully
22 Oct 2020
22 Oct 2020
22 Oct 2020
22 Oct 2020
22 Oct 2020
22 Oct 2020
I love this last one (Cladonia). Even the lichen says I love you
Image by Gerd Altmann
Dark, my bed beneath the world
Dark
But wait
What glimmering?
What minor lifting of gloom?
It slithers, this slither of light
This slice that intrudes, that doesn’t belong.
But whence it comes, this fabulous crescent?
Has it fallen from above,
From Heaven’s High Arch?
Has it fallen to visit this Low Dark Vault?
Welcome, Light.
56 words written for Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Vault
Monday. 19th October. Early bus out of Great Yarmouth and a walk along a Sandy Lane…
Sandy Lane: 19 Oct 2020
… keeping eyes ever keen for fungi…
Shaggy Parasol: 19 Oct 2020
Shaggy Parasol: 19 Oct 2020
… and the occasional flower in bloom…
Gorse: 19 Oct 2020
19 Oct 2020
Hare’s Foot Inkcap: 19 Oct 2020
… and into Fritton Wood, a pine plantation liberally mixed with native trees…
White-barked birch: 19 Oct 2020
… after recent high winds, pine cones were everywhere…
19 Oct 2020
Couldn’t resist this little vignette, so Christmassy
19 Oct 2020
The heath supports a wide range of fungi, not all of them healthy to eat…
The Sickener: 19 Oct 2020
The Deceiver: 19 Oct 2020
From woodland to heath… to swamp…
19 Oct 2020
… to marsh… and a look back to where the waterlogged soil is killing the trees…
Fritton Marsh: 19 Oct 2020
Between woodland and marsh, there grew a rose…
Rosa rugosa: 19 Oct 2020
19 Oct 2020
I’ve become obsessed with finding a purple fungus. This one is close, but it’s more of a Victorian Mourning Mauve
19 Oct 2020
Wide swathes of the plantation have been cleared with plans to quarry aggregates. I think that idea has not been abandoned. Too many rare species have their habitat here.
19 Oct 2020
19 Oct 2020
And the prize, the fungus-hunter’s treasure…
Fly Agaric: 19 Oct 2020
aka Amanita muscaria:19 Oct 2020
This one with its ‘birth’ veil still attached
19 Oct 2020
It was a fantastic day. These are a small selection of the fungi we found. Perhaps I’ll show you some of the other photos another time. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.
Fungi and lichen: 22 Oct 2020
There is a heathland atop the cliffs at Gunton (nr Lowestoft, Suffolk), and the rain has cut a gully. The sides of that gulley are host to heather and lichen… at just the right height to invite my camera…
Miniature another title achieved in Maria’s Antonia’s #2020picoftheweek
Crimson’s Creative Challenge 102
“Mally!” His cousin, deep-voiced, called him. “Mally, come on, stop hiding. Me and the boys are going out on the lake.”
Malcolm wanted to call in return, not to venture out there. But to alert the others was to give himself away. And he remembered what had happened to his brothers and sisters and cousins, his mother, his father, his grandpa and uncles. Weren’t many of them left now on that lake.
And he’d seen what the others had not. The long-shanks with their loud killing sticks.
BOOM! BOOM!
The long-shanks hunting season again had begun.
CCC102 [Focus is Mallard, male]
Here’s how it works:
Every Wednesday I post a photo (this week it’s that one above.)
You respond with something CREATIVE
Here are some suggestions:
You have plenty of scope and only two criteria:
If you post a link in the comments section of this post I’ll be able to find it
If you include Crimson’s Creative Challenge as a heading, WP Search will find it (theory)
by ‘Searching’ in the WP Reader (fingers crossed)
Here’s wishing you inspirational explosions. And FUN
6th October 2020: Mousehold Heath which in previous years has yielded some new-to-me species of fungi. Would we find new ones this year?
Every fungus hunter’s delight, recognised by all, even if unable to name it
Amanita muscaria aka Fly Agaric: 6 Oct 2020
And its brother…
already featured on this blog: Tawny Grisette. THAT was a new one for me
Turkey Tail: 6 Oct 2020
Nothing new here; it’s quite common. But it is a good specimen
Jelly ears: 6 Oct 2020
Another common fungus. But again, a good specimen
This next one could be one of several different species, several different families. I’ve yet to get to grips with these bonnets/parachutes/etcs. But I like the elfin size of it
Unnamed: 6 Oct 2020
Another Unnamed (possibly parachutes): 6 Oct 2020
Rose Bonnet: 6 Oct 2020
This is another group I’ve yet to identify with certainty, but I’ll take a guess at a Wood-tuft
Unnamed: 6 Oct 2020
Pretty as flowers: 6 Oct 2020
I have this recorded in my folder as In The Dark Lord’s Garden.
Hare’s Ears: 6 Oct 2020
This is classed as a “cup”. And it was a new find. Happy with that
Dapperling or Amanita??? 6 Oct 2020
The Dapperling and Amanita families have much in common
Shaggy Scalycap: 6 Oct 2020
What a wonderful name. And so easy to identify. And another new one for me.
Unnamed: 6 Oct 2020
I’d like to say it’s a waxcap. But there are several other species it could be.
Hoof bracket growing on birch: 6 Oct 2020
Love the colour of that one
Unnamed: 6 Oct 2020
I’m sure to an expert it would be easy to name. But I’m not that. I do see it often, spilling out from trees.
And finally an easy one…
Oysterling, underneath: 6 Oct 2020
Oysterling, above: 6 Oct 2020
And that, my friends, is all for today. I’ll have more for you next week. Maybe I’ll even be able to name a few more.
I hope it’s encouraged you to look more carefully at the places you’re passing. In the ordinary, the extraordinary hides.
image by Stefan Keller
A nightmare, I know it is
I’m LUCID dreaming
I can wake from it
I struggled to wake
I woke in my bed
NO! Not my bed
I’m dreaming again
I struggled to wake
I woke in my bed
NO! Not my bed
43 words written for Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Lucid
True story. I pulled myself through 5 layers of sleep to reach proper consciousness and my own bed. It was frightening.
Fungi season’s begun. So it’s off to Mousehold Heath for us. A bus to Norwich. A walk through the cathedral close
Norwich cathedral, south face: 6 Oct 2020
Then up the hill. Not high, but sufficiently steep. It’s where Robert Kett and his rebels set camp. (See Kett’s Rebellion)
Oaks trees on Mousehold Heath: 6 Oct 2020
Heather thrives on the heath: 6 Oct 2020
For centuries the heath was given over to sheep. Now, though much reduced in area, it provides the people of Norwich with a wonderful woodland interspersed with heathland
Hills, dells and dales: 6 Oct 2020
Parts of the heath were quarried for sand and gravel. Now reclaimed by Nature they tax the legs!
Bracken and pine: 6 Oct 2020
A woodland walk: 6 Oct 2020
6 Oct 2020
The unexpected: 6 Oct 2020
A wall that begins nowhere and ends nowhere. It’s a mystery to me
Magnificient trees: 6 Oct 2020
Out of the woods, returning to Norwich to catch the bus.
Quayside & River Wensum: 6 Oct 2020
Renovated riverside houses: 6 Oct 2020
But I remember them as rundown, ramshackle struggling one-man businesses
And a last look at the cathedral. As you can see, we’d been caught in the rain
North face of Norwich cathedral: 6 Oct 2020
Hope you enjoyed it as much as we did.
Oh, what’s that? What about the fungi we found? I’m saving that for Tuesday.
Swans at Whitlingham: 12 Oct 2020
Swans caught in the act of staring. But what are they looking at?
Swan at Whitlingham: 12 Oct 2020
This swan was splashing and beating the water with its wings. We figured it for an exhibitionist
Watch Me, another title achieved in Maria’s Antonia’s #2020picoftheweek
crispina kemp 