Mutability

Thank you to all those made wonderful guesses at the identity of the mysterious dripping wombat/ hedgehog .

The extraordinary solid wheeping dome was the start of a bracket fungi called a Red Belted Bracket ( I think!).  It takes years to mature and the original photo showed the first pulse of the fruiting body on a felled pine tree.

At first I thought a cyclist had left a water bottle on the pile of cut wood as it gleamed with droplets. I stretched out my hand tentatively, maybe the drops were solidifying resin, but no, they were ordinary water and lots of it. The log on which it was growing had been cut for months and there has been no rain for weeks and yet the fungi had found water to pump out all around itself in a sheath of jewels. As we clambered over the log pile we found the fungi in all states of development. The final unmistakable bracket was creamy white underneath, sweet smelling and still fringed in perfect droplets like tears.

A beautiful piece of creation and a salutary lesson in the mutability of fungi and how difficult they can be to safely identity as they change almost out of recognition as they grow.

 

Advertisement