In 2016 I’m doing a 365 Nature project. Learn more about the project and see all the 365 Nature posts.
I’ve spent so much time in the arboretum during the autumn finding fungi, I have overlooked my own garden. With the adjustment to preschool every day, it’s left less time for our own yard observations. That, coupled with one of the wettest autumns on record, I’ve spend very little time in our yard. I still watch the birds from our windows and so don’t completely neglect our yard, but there’s always far more to see while outside.
Today, while watching the Anna’s Hummingbird at our window feeder, I noticed a mushroom growing along our fence on an old branch. A few years ago a neighbor cut down a tree and I salvaged many of the branches for use in our backyard habitat. Many of them I laid down on the ground and others I stood up on end to create perches for birds. Most of them have grown a particular fungus, although I don’t know what it is. In one grouping of branches, the fungus is thick, clustering on the branches. I can easily tell the fungi that’s grown in past years, it’s brown or green, while the newest fungi is much brighter, with crisp colors.
