Fencepost of the Week #186
Sunday, 11 October 2020
Tuesday, 6 October 2020
Scaly Hedgehog Mushroom
This is a scaly hedgehog mushroom - Sarcodon squamosus. British distribution is mostly restricted to the Caledonian pine forests. I found this one by Loch Garten. It can be used to produce some nice blue-green shades of fabric dye.
Sunday, 4 October 2020
Sunday, 20 September 2020
Friday, 4 September 2020
False Puffball
This is Reticularia lycoperdon the false puffball - it is a slime mould that fruits by producing a foamy mass that expands from cracks in the wood in which it lives.
It then hardens and dries out. The pale, silvery cuticle cracks and falls away...
... to reveal the dusty brown spore mass which then gets carried away on the wind. (Photos sequence taken on 11th, 16th and 23rd of April)
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Below is a second sequence showing earlier stages of development - it begins as a globular mass before developing a cuticle. (Photos taken on 17th and 19th of April)
Monday, 31 August 2020
Adder Births 2020
The female adder from this post on adder courtship from April has been sunning itself all summer at the same place by a local forestry track. I have been checking up on it most days and today it was ready to give birth to five tiny little snakes. They all seemed ready to shed their skin for the first time within minutes of being born.
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| New born adder - Vipera berus |
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| New born adder - Vipera berus |
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| New born adder - Vipera berus |
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| New born adder - Vipera berus |
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| New born adder - Vipera berus |
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| The mother snake - looking a little bent out of shape, but recovering. |
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