NORTH NORFOLK: Fungi at Guybon's Wood

17th November 2018

The penultimate fungus study group foray of the year saw us in north Norfolk to visit Guybon's Wood, part of the usually private Swanton Novers complex. Tony, Steve & Yvonne were all absent, so the rest of us had to pull our weight to ensure we maximised our recording time.

We had a good mixture of regular attendees and less experienced folk, and spreading out we soon started to call out species, gamely recorded by Steve & Gill. Neil located a Pseudoclitocybe known as The Goblet, one of the identification features of which is that it can have forked gills. I had a look and saw a forked gill - it's always nice when species match their descriptions. Bleeding Conifer Crust was also seen nearby, along with a carpet of Slender Clubs and several Pipe Clubs.

Having Stewart with us meant we also recorded quite a bit of microfungi on plants, of which Laurel Speckle was new for me. I found a tiny orange cup on Larch twigs that I was able to key out at home as Larch Disco. Something I think I've seen before but not identified was Powderpuff Bracket (Postia ptychogaster), and some Sycamore leaves had been heavily marked by Cristulariella depraedens.

Whilst making sure we didn't leave anyone behind, we saw Mike taking photographs of the canopy. With our naturalists outlook we initially assumed there was a bird up there, before realising that actually it was just really beautiful light.

I recorded a few Agromyzids and we also saw an interesting scale insect that I've not got round to identifying yet. After a stop for lunch we located several slime moulds, christening the first Baked Bean Slime Mould (more formally Badhamia foliicola), Trichia decipiens and Ceratiomyxa fruiticulosa.

The species list continued to grow - I spotted some old Birch Polypores with undersides covered in Ochre Cushion, whilst Yellowing Russula was a species I don't see often. Fenugreek Stalkballs seem to have had a good year, whilst some Ash keys yielded two new species for me, both tiny black specks of different sizes. Lilac Dapperling (Cystolepiota bucknallii) was also new, a powdery purple fungus with a smell of coal gas. We began to head back, but it wasn't long before over half of the group were out of sight. It's always a risk leaving a dawdling group (what if they see something really exciting?) but keen to get home I decided to head back at a normal pace. I had a cup of tea at the car and they had still not emerged from the edge of the woods, so I think I took the correct option. Some of them might still be there now.