Friday 6 November 2015

Nature Study: Fungi

Going to look for fungi is something that I had never thought to do with children. Probably, I was too scared that they would try to eat them. This week, I plucked up my courage and did the fungi study from Exploring Nature with Children. It turned out that my children were more worried than me and initially, had to be asked not to kick the fungi to order to get rid of them to prevent the cats possibly being poisoned. Not that the cats have ever shown much interest in eating fungi!

Not being a great observer of fungi, I had looked in our garden earlier in the week to check that there were some fungi there, in case we couldn't find anything on our usual nature walk. In fact, there were fungi both in the park and the garden. The business of identifying fungi seems complicated and I'm not entirely sure about what we saw and certainly would not know what was poisonous! Please feel free to comment about the types we saw. I really don't have a clue.





This monstrosity was found in our garden.  I thought it was a puff ball but it doesn't look quite like the pictures.



On to our nature walk, in the pouring rain. We tend not to worry too much about the weather. The children have ski jackets from Muddy Puddles which I purchased in the sale, in the summer, which seem well able to copy with rain.

We found far, far more fungi than I was expecting especially near to, and on, a fallen tree.


















Tiny fungi at the base of a tree.

Fungi in a rotting tree.

This day felt autumnal with fallen leaves and



almost bare trees.



Riding home in the rain.



 I'm not sure that we are much wiser about identifying fungi but we have discovered a hidden world of fungi of which we were virtually unaware and some of my shop purchased mushrooms have disappeared in the cause of making spore prints.

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3 comments:

  1. You found loads! I am wondering if the first one you posted was a Common Earthball fungus?

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    1. I've just looked at some pictures online and think that you are probably right. Thank you.

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