Autumn is my favourite season. The flowers may have largely taken their leave, but in the wake come things brighter and stranger.
It’s a brittlegill, AKA a member of the Russula family. Something is eating the brittlegills; this is one of the more intact ones that I’ve found. My trailcams caught squirrels tucking into what appeared to be the much greyer charcoal burner Russula cyanoxantha, but that is unlikely to be the whole story. Rodents, slugs and even foxes eagerly accept wild mushroom buffet.
Russulas are famously difficult to identify to species level. This could be a beechwood sickener Russula noblis, which might explain why the squirrels haven’t munched on it.
They brighten up the woodland floor, whatever they are. A small spider is resting on this one’s stem.
Jelly-ear fungi decorate branches.
Mower’s mushrooms Panaeolus foenisecii add intrigue to the grass.
And bracket fungi of all kinds form shelves on the dead bones of old trees.
Autumn has much more to give. Most of the leaves are yet to fall.
A Walk with Wildlife 
Leave a comment