More new waxcaps

And this time here at The Beeches. I spotted some different looking waxcaps in the East field which is the best for waxcaps. If I hadn't had help I would have talked myself into assigning all three specimens into known waxcaps I have already identified and would have decided they were just unusual specimens but all three types looked different. Luckily an expert was on hand to look at them and then take them away for some serious identification work. Above is the first of the new species for The Beeches - the Cedarwood Waxcap (Hygrocybe russiocoriacea). Its distinctive feature is a smell of pencil shavings.

While we are on the subject of new waxcaps...

I came across this one on unimproved limestone pasture near Chepstow. It looks very like the little recorded Hygrocybe virginea var ochraceopallida which is usually found on limestone......

Yellow Foot Waxcap

This was a new waxcap for me - not found here at The Beeches but in a hilly field overlooking Tintern. It has a distinctive yellow colouration at the base of the stipe - hence its common name. The latin name is Hygrocybe flavipes.

Golden Waxcap

The Golden Waxcap (Hygrocybe chlorophana) is a common waxcap but I still struggle often to decide whether the yellow waxcap in front of me at any particular time is Golden Waxcap or Butter Waxcap or indeed one of the other yellowish waxcaps. I had a look at a group of waxcaps in a neighbour's field and I am reasonably confident they are H. chlorophana. They had the viscid cap, the greasy stipe, the stipe flattened and split and the distant gills so I guess they must be. I look forward to the day when I can tell from a few yards away which of the damn yellow waxcaps is in front of me.

Meadow Waxcap now fruiting

Actually there have been a few small ones a few weeks ago but this is the first proper Meadow Waxcap (Hygrocybe pratensis) of the season. I am expecting scores if not hundreds more. They are edible but not particularly tasty. The colour and the deeply decurrent gills are diagnostic and it is an outstandingly handsome fungi.

New Species - Twenty Plume Moth

It can be disheartening to try and identify a micro moth but this tiny one that turned up inside the house was so distinctive under a hand lens that I gave it a go. It took very little time to id this as a Twenty Plume Moth (Alucita hexadactyla) which strangely seems to have twelve plumes (six on each wing) rather than twenty.

Impressive (and tasty) fungi

I found this in a field in the next village - despite the recent damage it had sustained it is a very robust and impressive fruiting body. It is Agaricus macrosporus which as far as I know has no common name but still makes a good lunch!

Red Bartsia - also spreading

Definitely one of my favourites - this late-flowering semi-parasitic flower is sometimes hard to spot amongst the grass. However close examination showed that it was spreading like the other flowers that for once get a chance to set seed. It has increased around the original couple of plants but also sent a few outliers about fifteen feet in several directions. I have cut most of the fields but shall leave this patch uncut for a couple of weeks yet.

New Species - Fox Moth

I haven't set the moth trap recently but nonetheless I have a new moth species to report as I came across this very distinctive larva in the field and I am reasonably sure it is a Fox Moth larva (Macrothylacia rubi). A symphony of orange, black and hair.