Stephen and Dana reminded me that I promised we would find lots of mushrooms this year. I do try to keep my promises and I will not give up hope of our having a great season - until the end of October! Seriously, the best mushroom collecting time is August and September - and assuming it rains sufficiently, there is no reason why the mushrooms should be less prolific this year than any other good year. Of course, on today's hunt, we did not encounter much in the way of fungal biodiversity. Except for a sole stinkhorn (Mutinus elegans), the only other photo worthy fungal find was something Roger passed on to me, Apiosporina morbosa - the plum genus black knot fungus. Now that is pretty pathetic! Other things we found were:
Stereum Ostrea; Trichaptum biformis; Favolus alveolaris
Megacollybia platyphylla, Russula sp.
Stemonitis sp.; Fuligo septica

There is always something to make even the driest walk worth while and this time it was the discovery of wild blueberries and even a few blackberries. They are just starting to ripen, but we found enough to satisfy our hunger for something special.
And of course, the company was perfect.

Dianna

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