Forest of Dean 9th September 2011

I'm visiting my friends in Wales this weekend, so I stopped off at The Forest of Dean for a fungi hunt. Just a few metres from the car I found this tiny Chanterelle.

This was a great start, as I have found most of my Chanterelles in this area. Unfortunately, that was the only one I found! I carried on and found this Shaggy Ink Cap (edible). These are common and sometimes grow on my lawn at home.

As usual, there was plenty of evidence of wild boars around the car park verges.

You can see where the boar has "rooted" along with his nose in the turf. Although they are culling the boar, I see plenty of fresh evidence of their presence. I carried on and saw this pretty fungi growing from an old tree stump. I didn't find this in my first pass through the Roger Phillips book. Will check again.

I could hear a buzzard calling, so I stopped to watch it. After a few minutes there were four flying around. Maybe a pair and their offspring. One landed on a tree along way off, but I got this shot using 28x zoom!

Not many fungi around yet. Still too dry perhaps, but I came across this nice bracket fungus on a dead tree stump. Possibly a Many Zoned Polypore.

The most common fungi around this day was this puffball. Possibly a Common Earth-ball.

On the way back to the car I saw this small orange fungi. Again, not found in first trawl through Roger Phillips book. I'll have  another look.

Even with the Roger Phillips book, fungi is difficult to identify! 40,000+ varieties in the UK!

A quick trip to get some nuts

Went to my favourite wood where I had seen a nice crop of hazelnuts earlier. Thought I would get a few before the squirrels had them all. Well, the squirrels have definitely been removing the nuts as there weren't as many on the tree as last time. So I picked a few to try before they had them all. They aren't fully ripe yet, so I'm going to keep a few to see if they ripen at home. You can eat them now though and they have a nice crunchy kernel.

It won't be long before the chestnuts are ready, so that will be a visit to the Forest of Dean in October.

Swindon Village For Some Blackberries

A quick walk around the fields at Swindon Village. Main aim is to pick some blackberries for my blackberry and apple crumble. I started along "Dog Bark Lane" and found the blackberries. (I knew they were there and they are the big ones!). Walking along the lane I saw a wild plum/damson tree I didn't know was there. A good crop on it. Nice to have another source in case the other ones around here are plundered!

An excellent crop of sloes this year, but I will be using the wild plums/damsons for my damson gin. You need to pick 5 or 6 sloes to one plum and as I'm lazy, I'll use the plums.

I could hear a buzzard calling. See the speck in this photo :)

I only had my phone camera, so couldn't zoom in on it. I also saw a sparrow hawk later. I got to the hedge where my favourite blackberry bushes were, to find the farmer has "trimmed" the  hedge.I suppose he has to do this sometimes or the hedge encroaches on the field. So, back to the start where there were more big blackberries. I went back on a different path than usual, just in case there was something interesting and would you believe it, I found a mass of wild hops!

Place noted for future home brewing needs. I'm not sure if you can use wild hops for brewing. I think I read somewhere that they don't have enough flavour. Must investigate. On reading my  River Cottage Hedgerow Handbook, John Wright says you can eat the young shoots that come up in spring. One for next year!

Back home to make the crumble!