Asters and Friends

Tiny bumblebees and other pollinators have been taking full advantage of late blooming asters. 

My sister had a bumblebee nest by her front door this summer and we learned quite a lot about the creatures. They didn't bother anyone, but we did have to keep the dogs from snapping the spicy flies. 

At this late date, queen bumbles have left the nest to hibernate over the winter and their non-queen daughters are living out their last days in the fields, frequently sleeping on flowers when its too cold or dark for them to fly. 

In the spring, the queens that survive will build new nests and hope to get a new brood of daughters going to help them create a full and healthy colony before hatching some males and new queens to start the process all over again. 

The clouded sulphur butterflies take advantage of the late bloomers, too. The white female above blends in with the white asters. 

Asters are lovely enough all by themselves, but knowing the important part they play in the survival of late feeding pollinators and migrating butterflies makes them even more special. 

I caught this bumblebee lifting off and heading over to taste a different flower. 

I hope you enjoyed this little field trip as much as I did. :)

More Mushrooms on Monday?

Sulphur shelf or chicken of the woods are very tasty sauteed in butter, especially if you find them as brilliant and fresh as this batch was. 

Aren't they beautiful? That color isn't enhanced - they're really that bright. They're pretty hard to miss while walking through the forest. I noticed evidence of another bloom someone had already harvested - just orange remnants stuck to the side of a log. 

 

Interestingly, on the same big pine snag, about five feet lower and around the other side, a lacy group of aged turkey tail fungus filled the crevices in the bark. I thought the textures and colors were a nice juxtaposition. 

Another set of turkey tail growing on a fallen poplar tree, was a surprising color of green. It looked like that poplar was sprouting a whole new kind of leaf! 

I thought this colorful fellow, growing between the pieces of a rotting birch tree added a perfect touch to a picturesque forest floor vignette. 

This beauty was large and impressive, with an undulating cap and a lot of personality! 

Lots of fungus lately, right? It's what I've been seeing out in the woods! We'll have to see what I can locate for the next blog installment!  

Mushroom Meandering Memories

I finally finished the latest round of loss list paperwork after the house fire (the deadline was Monday and they sent me additions as late as Saturday afternoon!). 
 

I thought it might be a good opportunity to step back in time and ignore the blowing snow and fire cleaning for a few minutes to celebrate an autumnal mushroom walk Piper and I took before all the excitement began. The bear's head tooth on the decaying fallen tree behind Piper was one of the main reasons for the excursion. They're delicious! 

My mushroom books are all in the pile of things they are trying to clean, deodorize and reclaim (fingers crossed) so I'm missing my reference books and haven't done any identification work. 

There were different textures, colors and growth habits everywhere. 

I thought these (whatever they might be) were particularly interesting It looked like the emerging fungus was being parasitized by a different fungus. These were blooming on the ground near the base of trees and stumps. 

I will post more of these in a day or so. It was a lovely walk with lots to see - and I hope it's a nice break from the cold, wind and snow.  

 

In the Nick of Time

The last time I went down to the family homestead to pick beans and tomatoes and otherwise puddle around in the gardens, the zinnias were absolutely glorious. 

The brilliant colors and beautiful blooms were a feast for the eyes. 

I'm so glad I took a moment to snap a few pictures of our wondrous row. 

Why? Well, we got nailed by an unexpected frost. So, all these amazing plants are now brown and wilted. 

They were amazing while they lasted, though! 

A Minor Mother's Day Mystery - Mapped

Here's the clue from yesterday, if you missed it - or so you don't have to toggle back and forth to check for the mystery's subject(s). 

The subject in question at the moment is close to the middle of the picture. Not quite perfectly centered (there had to be a little photographic balance, after all). And there is more than one, but the others will be frustratingly elusive from this angle. 

Every year, our family would spend Mother's Day weekend wandering around out in the woods looking for treasure. It was a search to rival any Easter egg hunt and we children had as good a chance to make great discoveries as our parents, since our eyes were lower to the ground and provided an excellent vantage point. 

This is the one you should be able to spot in the mystery picture. I tried to get another picture at the same angle, so you can look for shape and shadow. It's the one that put me on alert. 

Once a little lower to the ground (children's eye level) in an effort to gather the first specimen, its friends were easier to locate. 

My brother and I harvested nearly two gallons of black morels in our afternoon of hunting, but a lot of crawling along on hands and knees through brambles was required to accomplish the feat. 

However, there's nothing quite like a pan of fresh morel mushrooms fried in butter for hors d'oeuvres as a reward for the effort. Yum!

I have made morel mushrooms the subject of one of my block prints, and it was fun to try to keep some of the mystery of the hunt in the final image. If anyone's interested, I can post a picture of it. :) 

A Minor Mother's Day Mystery

This little mystery is especially for BetsyLee (which, in itself, might be a dead giveaway). 

As always, you can click on the image to enlarge it. I left it as big as I possibly could. 

This is on my family's property and reminds me of the group outings we would always take on Mother's Day. The reveal will come tomorrow. :)

Happy Mother's Day!

Fruits of the Field

 Summer sweets are available along the trail for the observant hiker. 

Raspberries are in season and I found a nice patch to raid along the way.

I did a carving of these guys a few years ago with three different blocks and colors, because they're not only delicious, they're visually interesting. 

Baloo loved raspberries and would race me to the treats, so I had to teach little Piper about the joys of berry picking. It didn't take her long to catch on to the goodness. 

She can't reach as high, though, and sometimes asks for a little handout.

This wood satyr butterfly seemed to like hanging out in the brambles, too. 

There's Gold in Them Thar Woods!

Here's the first picture of gold. I was hoping I would find some of these while Piper and I were out walking in the woods. I was quite excited. 

Can you see what made me so enthusiastic? You can enlarge the picture by clicking on it. This was a great find. Of course, I'm one of those odd people that will eat things I pick up off the ground. :)

And this was only one of the blooms I found. 

Here's another batch I found farther from the trail in a different area. 

Here's more glorious edible gold. Chanterelles are such a choice mushroom, with a marvelous, meaty texture and a flavor that blends that earthy umami flavor with a little bit of fruity goodness. 

It's also a good mushroom for a beginner to identify, since once you know what it looks like, it would be really hard to mistake it for anything else. 

Here's a beautiful, big bowl ready to slice and sauté. I was able to put three 8 ounce bags into the freezer for later use and still have a few left over for my scrambled eggs. Woo hoo! 

Garden Glory

I don't know about anyone else, but I can use something a bit uplifting and cheerful today.

When I downloaded these from the camera and prepared them for the blog, I discovered I have enough garden pictures that this post would be too long, if I used them all. So, there will probably be another garden stroll in a day or two.

The neighborhood gardens are all flourishing, except for mine, of course. The bunnies have completely destroyed everything I planted this year, except one lonely strawflower, which is starting to bloom. (Not the plant pictured above, which I looks a little bit rose-ish, but I don't know what it is for sure.) Anyway, while walking Piper, I have been taking pictures of particularly beautiful blooms. 

The hydrangea (or change rose, as it's sometimes called) blooms pink or blue, depending on soil acidity. these were interesting because the same bush had pink, blue and purplish blossoms all at the same time. 

It's very confused. I can relate to this! 

Daylilies dazzle the eye with their many varieties and colors. 

Hollyhocks are blooming, too, and this deep maroon one by an old, historic homesite seemed to evoke the era of the house, itself. 

I think these pink beauties are dahlias, but do correct me if I'm wrong, dahling. :)

Nasturtiums are flowering at the neighborhood restaurant. I wonder if they're using the peppery, edible blooms in any of their dishes this season. 

I do have one volunteer rose growing wild among the spirea bushes in my yard. I think the rabbits missed it because its stems are tangled in the woodier shrubbery. 

I hope this was a nice respite from the great, wide world. Sometimes it really is important to stop and smell (or at least look at) the roses and other beautiful things surrounding us. 

 

 

Field and Fungus

Piper and I discovered a huge bloom of mushrooms (most of them way past their prime) while out on a walk. I haven't taken the time to really try and identify them, but a quick page through my mushroom books didn't turn up any obvious matches.

They were growing on an enormous pile of wood chips. I'm guessing that BetsyLee will have the answer for us pretty quickly! :)

Another dog walker I met on a different excursion said he thought they were edible, but didn't know what they were, either. (I don't eat anything to which I have not been formally introduced!)

These guys, however, are one of the first mushrooms I got to know and love when I was a child. The fairy ring makes a grand addition to scrambled eggs or any kind of gravy. I remember we used to find them in cow pastures or sometimes in cemeteries, before the grounds keepers started using too many fungicides on the grass, killing them all off.

 Piper didn't care about the mushrooms at all, but thoroughly enjoyed the walk down the rarely used trails.

There's a Morel to This Story

It's hunting season again. Time to get out and stalk the wild things.

These little beauties can really hide among the leaf litter and matted grasses, so it's a treat to spot the distinctive pattern of true treasure.

My brother and I covered some territory and had a pretty good outcome this year. We hope there will be more to come. Yes, I admit it - we're greedy like that. :)

The old favorite mushroom hunting areas we traipsed through with our parents when we were children succumbed to the emerald ash borer and died out with the ash trees, so we're always looking for new spots where they've decided to bloom.

A couple gallons later, we were pretty happy with our efforts. 

Yes, there were some extras in another bag that made their way into a pan for hors d'oeuvres as a bonus. 

Yum!