Cup-lichen Sunset

Fencepost of the Week #18

Maze-gill

Monday Mushroom #16

Maze-gill - Daedalea quercina

Bracket fungi often grow outwards and downwards producing a series of contour-lines as they expand from their leading edge. Where several brackets overlap, they often produce really beautiful, organically flowing forms.

But the Maze-gill is named for the equally wonderful patterns that develop beneath the contoured cap - the fungus on the right has been turned over to reveal this labyrinthine underside.

The Clumps

I visited 'The Clumps' yesterday - I found them while browsing  an OS map. Awesome.

I love clumps...

Concentric

Fencepost fo the Week #17

Hopefully Yours

My local writer's group - The Raggedy Hopefuls - stopped for the summer yesterday, but we finished on a high  with the release of 'Hopefully Yours' - our first collection of writings. It was produced by Eleanor McKay of the Argyll and Bute Library Service and is available as part of the Local Collections at all the libraries in the area. Here is the cover and foreword:

A Collection of Short Stories and Poems 

From The Raggedy Hopefuls April 2011

Hello from the Raggedy Hopefuls, amateur writers from Dunoon and the Cowal area. We are a relatively new group, having started meeting in February of 2010. We hope our work will amuse, entertain or inspire you, and perhaps give you a few laughs. Our members invented most of the snazzy titles for these stories over coffees at various locations around town. At each meeting we would decide on a theme or subject for the next meeting and everyone would try to write a story involving that theme to present next time.  

Please visit our website at http://raggedy.webs.com for more information about us and to read more of our work. 

Edited by Jacqueline Couch 

Cover design by Ben Mitchell and Rima DeFord

We are currently looking at ways to get this work into wider circulation, perhaps using a print on demand book service, or similar. In the meantime, you can read many of our stories at the raggedy.webs forums - take a wee look!

Rainbows!

Scenic Sundays #13












I joined a volunteer work party on the John Muir Trust estate in Knoydart for the last weekend in May. We had a lovely long weekend renovating a footpath and doing some plant surveys.

The weather was pretty bad - strong winds and lots of rain, but I did get some nice, moody landscape photographs - most of them were taken while standing in the entrance to my tent - it was too wet to risk taking my camera outside much.

Follow this link for an animated version of the above rainbow - the animation was programmed by me in javascript, and may not be compatible with your web browser, apologies in advance for the amateurish code.

Matchstick Lichen

Fencepost of the Week #16

And a neighbouring post, taken on the same day is online here. Note: this uses my badly written javascript to do an animated focus pull - my programming may not be compatible with your browser!

Wolf Spider & Slow Worm

Wildlife Wednesdays #17

Two for one!