Dalgety Bay - kissing frogs

Yesterday (as today) I didn't have much time in the field. As a temporarily single dad I had lunchtime to gather material and oodles of time in the study once the manchild was tucked up in bed. The priority therefore was to gather material! With a reachable target I went to the ground game and gathered promising leaf and wood litter for later perusal. This is a methodology I learned on a microfungi weekend I had with some fungus-bothering friends and very productive it can be too.

On this occasion I was spending a lot of time kissing frogs to find a prince. Some species were too immature to separate (there are two very similar pyrenomycetes which like sycamore petioles) while some pluriverous fungi which might have been doable evaded me. I found one birch leaf in the mix which is normally good for a couple of banker species. It was bare. I still managed to put up 3 new species which pushed me within reach of success.

Then, when I woke up this morning it dawned on me that I have two enormous birch trees in my garden! Bingo! Both common species of fallen birch leaves were quickly rounded up before the school run. Three to go. Surely nothing could go wrong.

The Mycena below is the kind of thing you think you have no chance of identifying. It's the Dewdrop Bonnet and on its stipe it has tortuose cystidia. These hold onto water droplets and so are responsible for both its English and scientific names. I've already recorded it but it's a lovely thing.

Botryobasidium aureum (conidial stage)

Hemimycena tortuosa

Birch leaf Gnomonia and Venturia

Dicyrtomina fusca

Numbers:

326	*	fungus	Botryobasidium aureum	A corticioid fungus
327	*	collembola	Dicyrtomina fusca	A springtail
328		fungus	Merismodes anomala	A fungus
329		fungus	Gnomonia alni-viridis	a pyrenomycete
330		fungus	Venturia ditricha	a pyrenomycete