A day off odd little observances today, which don't easily link up to each other. We parked up beside the forest that adjoins part of the commons and took an amble along the road that overlooks Tyrpentwys valley, the place we visited on Saturday. From above the landscape seemed to have a much better show of autumnal colour in the beech trees.
The fields adjoining the road are undulating to say the least and are a mixture of pasture for horses, sheep and cattle. Unfortunately six beautiful badger faced sheep ran away out of camera capability to get them on record. And ... I was wrong in the fact that all the sheep had been gathered off the mountain ... I captured these scratching their back ends on an old, fly tipped stump, who seemed totally unconcerned about the presence of dog.
We wandered over the autumnal terrain. looking for interesting things. The dog ... was more interested in scents and his favourite pastime ... splashing about in puddles. There were plenty of them after last nights rain and just as I had captured this reflective photo ...
Yep, guess what? Dog had dived into the temporary pool of water, disrupting the surface! Just as I took this last photograph, behind me a unique bird call alerted me to the presence of three (rare here) lapwings. Last year there were four. But there were other things mad mutt simply wasn't interested in like this old, started but never finished birds nest. Skylark or Meadow Pipit I will now never know, but something disturbed its completion. A common plant on the mountain is a species of reed that when young produces a wine glass shape of growth.
The fact that one single seed can push it's way up through whatever grows (in this case amongst whinberry plants) but also tough grasses and sphagnum mosses shows a lot about its tenacity. Yet another invasive plant amongst the diversity of those on the commons and barely edible to the free grazing sheep. And then I came across a strange, jelly like substance.
I've come across this so many times before. It looks like frog or toads spawn but without the characteristic dark spots of future amphibian adult creatures. I've often wondered about what causes it and despite discussions with experts and much searching on the internet, I cannot find a definitive answer. My best guess was that it is a fungus. It is certainly an odd looking and ... from close up ... a rather disgusting looking substance.
Just try googling "The 'Jelly' mystery." and you will be as confused as I am.
Having left that behind I found to my delight (sadly not edible fungi) but a late flower.
This foxglove was fresh flowering even though nearly all the others on the commons are well into the seeding part of their life cycle. As for any edible fungi there was little sign except for very well (probably slug or snail munched remains) of what might ... possibly have been eatable specimens . But, I don't begrudge these small species for eating what might have been edible for me. As I've mentioned before, I can survive this winter but ... for our local wildlife. I worry this year. There is so little available for insects, small and larger mammals though I think that the scavenger and opportunist species may well have a feast this winter as the smaller end of the evolutionary scale have been unable to survive this year of constant wet conditions.
But on the way home, some of my favourite fields ... were looking gloriously autumnal.
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