THE RAMBLINGS OF A STRUGGLING ARTIST ON LIFE WITH TWO TERRIERS, A PONY WITH ISSUES AND OTHER WILDLIFE AND BIRDS THAT CROSS OUR PATH

7 October 2013

TURKEYTAIL AND DEVIL'S MATCHSTICKS


This should really be another bits and pieces post, but with such brilliantly descriptive names that we have for our flora and fauna, I couldn't resist using them. I've only just found out about the Devil's Matchsticks, having struggled to identify the various red tipped Cladonia lichens, I can now go colloquial. I managed to find the lichen book I've been wanting for over a year now but have not been able to afford, for £5.00 plus the postage, and it should be arriving in the next few days. It's an ex-library copy. Very exciting and I hope to be boring you rigid with it very soon. 


We saw these fabulous Turkeytails on a very unsuccessful blackberry picking trip yesterday afternoon, along with lots of other fungi and lichens, and here are those Devil's Matchsticks - two different types:



Very early Fly Agaric before its white spots have appeared or the top spread out:


These next two fungi were impressively big:



I should really have waited for the book for these two but they were so stunning. I should also have put something to show the scale of them. They are absolutely tiny. 



Strange plump heart-shaped fungus:


A huge Dung Fungus:


No idea but the gills were so beautiful:


Dew on Gorse:


Foggy scenes from a few days ago:




Wet Jack:


Chink in the cloud:


Cloud hills:


View on the way to the river today:


I think Jack may be more of a water hound than Snippet...........


......who hates getting in - he was whimpering when I took this and I had to lift him off the tussock and dump him in:




I'm hoping my mothy friends will be able to identify this tiny character I found dead on the kitchen worktop this morning; less than a centimetre long. An Antler moth - thanks David and CT!



A Speckled Wood basking on the washing on Saturday. My first butterfly this year to keep still long enough for me to get really close:


Today, having failed to have beef tomatoes delivered in my internet supermarket shopping last week, I asked for them in our very tiny greengrocer's in Chagford (see below - it's about three feet wide inside).


My request was greeted as if I had asked for caviar with the comment that:

"We don't get much call for them these days" (with a raised eyebrow).

I should point out that Chagford, by rural standards, is extremely cosmopolitan. Am I missing something here? There were none when I rushed into Exeter's branch of Sainsbury's over the weekend either. Any theories received with interest. 

The Christmas card choices are very interesting and I'll be ordering them this week. Not the ones I would have chosen so I'm very glad I asked you or no one would have wanted them by the look of it. I'll Keep you posted. Until next time, here's lovely Snippet in the grass.



44 comments:

  1. I loved the fungi pics, we often see several different types out dog walking and wonder what they are all called. I particularly liked the gap in the clouds and of course the dog photos. They remind me of a "before and after" hair restorer ad :-D

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm wondering if Jack may sprout more hair once winter sets in. Snip is definitely hairier than his parents!

      Delete
  2. Te first photos look like a Spanish lady's mantilla

    Ps do you do commissions for Christmas card designs?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They do! I'll email you regarding Christmas cards....

      Delete
  3. Dartmoor looks very atmospheric in the mist.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Our neighbours have a very big black hound who looks and sounds very Sherlock Holmes-ish when howling in the mist.

      Delete
  4. We have fungi in the America that resembles the turkey tail--very aptly named as we have an abundance of wild turkeys.
    I like knowing the names of things and can often fit a bird or plant into at least a broad category. With bird books I get bogged down in differences between male and female plumage, juveniles, winter coloring, etc.
    I think my fuji is capable of way more refinements than I'm capable of figuring out and remembering to apply in a given situation. I'm feeling like I went for a too sophisticated upgrade when I replaced my little Canon.
    The detail of your photos is exquisite.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Reading up about that fungus, also known as Rainbow fungus (Trametes Versicolor), it occurs all over the world in various forms.

      My Fuji can do amazing things but I don't have the time or patience to stand there footling with it while the subject flies/scuttles/runs away! I occasionally tinker with it afterwards if it's worth bothering with and the exposure is particularly rubbish, but otherwise I don't bother. I would dearly love a proper expensive SLR but I just can't afford it. I'd better start saving....

      Delete
  5. The two Boletus mushrooms are bloody Ceps, or the top one is for sure! Go back and pick them, they're delicious! Also, I liked your juxtaposition of dog's arsehole and cloud arsehole a little later.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I will.

      You seem to have an arsehole fixation Tom although, having looked at the two photos together, you do have a point.

      Delete
  6. The turkey tails are fabulous...exactly like the tails on the male wild turkeys who prance around the garden in the spring.
    Jane x

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Isn't it a brilliant name? We have an organic turkey farm next door but I only ever hear them.

      Delete
  7. Hi Em So many Fungi varieties and very well photographed. I love the misty shots on the Moors, very atmospheric. That little store in your village is sweet.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You can only fit three people inside and, when you want to leave, the other two have to flatten them selves against the bananas!

      Delete
  8. Lovely photos once again. The fungi are fascinating, I wish I would identify more of them. I love the pearly-dew on the gorse, and the Speckled Wood photo is wonderful too. Great to see the dogs having so much fun in the water (once they're both in!)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Well now Tom has identified the big ones, I'm off up the hill later today to see if they're still edible.

      Delete
  9. A lovely varied post with loads of great pics :-) I also found lots of that lichen when I was up on the North York Moors at the weekend so your ID has been very helpful. The moth looks like an Antler Moth, a nice find even it was dead. All the best :-)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks David - Having looked at lots of others, I'm sure you're right.

      Delete
  10. Lovely post Em - great photos of the smaller members of the Fungi tribe. I remember your teensy Chagford greengrocers, but you would have thought the London Set would demand Beefsteak Tomatoes for their recipes . . .

    The moorland photos, as always, pull at my heartstrings.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think Heston or Delia need to go on telly for Waitrose and eulogise about them before they'll come back into fashion!

      Delete
  11. Oh my! We have that same Turkey Tail fungi in the reserve I walk our dog in, but I've never known its name. Thank you Em! And, as we're supposed to be exercising, and she's on a lead (being totally untrustworthy!) I don't get to stop and admire them. But the exercise in such a beautiful place is a joy anyway.

    I felt for Snippet - I can never understand why our Goldie will jump into freezing water that no sensible animal would want a bar of! It's about breed differences I suppose.

    How is Trigger? All ready for winter I hope?

    Thanks for the lovely photos.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Virginia, Trigger's coat is sprouting; I'm sure there's a horsey technical word for that, but I don't know it! I'm considering what to do with him over winter given that I can't afford to feed four ponies hay. I could possibly bring him back here at night and take him to see his friends in the day. He can spend all night chomping then and perhaps put some weight on. I would have preferred him to go into winter a bit fatter than he is!

      Delete
    2. I think that's a really good notion Em. When I had a pony I used to resent feeding all the other ponies in the paddock, and feed costs are so high now. And he'll relax knowing he's not competing for the hay too.

      Delete
    3. Extortionate. Even hay is £4.50 a bale; not sure what the NZ exchange rate is at the moment!

      Delete
  12. The Turkey Tail has helped me ID one of my mushie finds from the weekend so thanks for that one :-)

    The moth is an Antler Moth. Very pretty.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I do love those furry ruffs they have. Thanks CT!

      Delete
  13. LOVE the Turkeytails! They look just like the real ones!

    Love the foggy scenes with the ponies and of course always love the moor.

    ReplyDelete
  14. WOW Em - fantastic! LOVED the fungi - definitely inspired me to get some artwork up in my kitchen.
    Dx

    ReplyDelete
  15. I hope to see photos. I keep missing your posts but I think if I just add you to my list, I don't need to be a follower.

    ReplyDelete
  16. That Antler Moth looks like something out of Star Wars!
    Amazing photo!
    You seem to have a good variety of toadstools on Dartmoor, more than we have here.......but we do have beef tomatoes in our local shop!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm taking my mum to Waitrose tomorrow morning (I can't afford to shop there myself!) and I know they sell big ones there. However, they're marketed as 'Jack Hawkins' rather than BEEF. Perhaps they think it sounds a bit aggressive.

      Delete
  17. Wow what cool photos. ALWAYS enjoy them all. That big red fungi looks just like a tomato!!

    ReplyDelete
  18. I have been 'feasting' on your photos and so enjoyed the many beauties - and what an array of fungi, lichen, living creatures, views of Dartmoor, skies etc.
    Those gills were beautiful weren't they?
    I photographed that very same greengrocers earlier this year!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I'm ashamed to say I nicked that from the Chagford web site. I always forget to take my camera into town.

      Delete
  19. Beautiful photos as always - love the photo with a bit of blue sky peeping through - it looks like an entrance to another world :)

    Fungi and lichen are superb - love the names too :) Hope your book arrives soon.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Your description is far more savoury than Tom's!

      Delete
  20. They do think up some imaginative names for things, but I do like it when a name describes the appearance of that particular thing, makes it easier to remember!! Wonderful photos of all those interesting fungi. I also went on a walk photographing lots of fungi, just waiting for my fungi book to arrive so I can have a go at identifying them before I put them in a post.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Mine has been dispatched so any day now.....

      Delete
  21. Marvellous fungi, I can see you and CT enjoying many posts together! Turkeytail is a great name! Now I thought beef tomatoes were nothing special or exotic either so thought this was hilarious. I think that each time you go into Chagford you should now ask the greengrocer for something 'exotic' just for the fun of it.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The strange thing is, you can buy fennel, rocket and many varieties of local apple, just not a big tomato. Perhaps it's a space issue?

      Delete
  22. Beautiful pictures as ever Em :-) The story of the greengrocer made me smile. We asked the little deli in our local Dartmoor town if they could get a pannetone for Christmas - they offered us pancetta!! Hehe it did make me laugh....

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The Deli here would sell it, just at an extortionate price!

      Delete

Thank you so much for leaving a comment. It's great to read them and I will always try to reply.