16 December 2017

I came across a passage today that I thought had some relevance to the Square Metre project: "We know that an unseen, untouched English landscape is a myth.  We know that a long and complex interaction between constant natural processes, and more recent human activity has largely formed all the landscapes we can see today, and that landscape is indivisible from the human world."

Farley, P. & Roberts, M. S. (2011)  Edgelands. Jonathan Cape, London.

It was frosty again this morning and a couple of sulphur tuft fungi (Hypholoma fasciculare) that I found on a decaying log beside Troy Track had ice on their caps.  This species occurs quite frequently in M3 and I have recorded it between June and December.

I also gathered a few dead leaves from M3, as I sometimes do, to sort through them and see if I could find anything of interest.  On a large goat willow leaf (Salix caprea) I found an old gall of a Pontania sawfly species, possibly P. tuberculata or P. gallarum. 

On a spindle leaf I found, under the microscope, some deeply unimpressive microfungi - clusters of small black pimples.  They might be conidiomata of Ceuthospora euonymi, but that is largely a default speculation as I cannot find anything else in the literature that fits.