Fungi and Dragonflies

I visited Scadbury Park Nature Reserve on a rainy day and i was immediately surprised by the vast amount of King Alfred's Cake fungi (Daldinia concentrica). The name of this fungus comes from the legend of when Alfred the Great was hiding in the countryside from the Danes in 870. He was put in charge of watching cakes in the oven and fell asleep, leaving the cakes to burn. The fungus resembles a burnt cake. They also have the name 'Cramp Balls' in reference to the belief in medieval times that carrying this fungus around with you would ward off cramps. There are plenty of ash trees in the woods here, shooting up into the sky like antenna. King Alfred's Cake are a fungus associated exclusively with ash trees and that was clear to see in these woods, nearly every fallen limb or ash tree itself was covered in colonies of the fungi. King Alfred's Cake is a saprobe fungus, this means it feeds on dead and decaying wood. Saprobic fungi have an important role in returning nutrients back into the soil. When cut open, the fungus resembles charcoal, with a metallic sheen and rings that resemble the growth rings in trees, just like rings in the trunk of a tree, the rings inside this fungus show a year's growth. This fungus is used by people sometimes to catch a spark. The inside of this fungus is flammable and smoulders for a long time, making it suitable as tinder.

 King Alfred's Cake cut open, revealing the
growth rings (not my photo)

Am impressive Birch tree

King Alfred's Cake colony

Further walking through the woods led me to a clearing between some Yew trees, a Beech tree had been rooted out of the ground and there was some fungi growing around the tree's now rotting root system. The first two photos are of the parasol mushroom (Macrolepiota procera) a fungus that can be eaten and is said to have a sweet taste. These mushrooms are quite fresh and their current domed form will slowly unfurl into the parasol shape that this mushrooms hails it's name from. The third photo is of a Blusher mushroom (Amanita rubescens) just shooting through the leaf litter. a close relative of the familiar Fly Agaric. This fungi earned it's named from the reddish bruising left on the fruiting body when touched. This mushroom is also edible, but only once cooked.

Parasol mushroom

Parasol mushroom



I came to an area that had recently had some trees felled. This made a good example for a brief lesson on why tree felling is good for the woodlands. Below is a picture of an area of woodlands that had no trees felled and underneath that the area where trees had been felled. The first thing we notice about these pictures is light difference. The area has a thick canopy of Sycamore trees, not letting much light in to the woodland floor. We can see from this photo only juvenile Sycamores are doing well here. But in the second picture there is much more light on the floor, the suffocating canopy had been taken away with the felling of trees and light was now allowed free reign to burst onto the woodland floor, giving it life. We can see in this picture there is much more flora on the ground. This is especially important as ground flora are important food plants and produce flowers which are important for nectar-feeding insects. 

Area that had no trees felled, no ground flora present except for juvenile Sycamore trees 

Area where trees had been felled, lots of light and ground flora.

After sheltering from a rain shower under a truly impressive Hawthorn tree, i returned back to this area to continue observing it. Something had changed in the short time i was gone. The ground was now alive, positively hopping with life. The shower had enticed out all the hiding toadlets, now racing for shelter as the rain had stopped and a homo sapien was closely watching them . I saw about 20 toadlets in 5 minutes. Toads haven't been doing very well recently, i hadn't seen any this year up until now, this was great to see. As i tip toed around them, i noticed this same area had damp patches here and there. Is this where the toadlets grew up? Was this an area that flooded when there was high levels of rainfall? There has been a lot of rainfall recently and as mentioned only some areas were what i would call "damp", there were no actual bodies of water. I'll continue to monitor this mystery.

Before i could leave though, somebody else wanted my attention. As i walked away, i was stopped by a female Southern Hawker (Aeshna cyanae) who wanted her photo taken. I stopped and watched her for a while, as she flitted around and hunted mosquitoes. The sound of a dragonflies wings as it's in flight is music that is completely overlooked.