Nature Notes from Argyll
(and occasionally other places)

Tue 26 Jan 2010 Seil

A Seil Natural History Group midweek recording walk in the woods on Seil north of the Clachan Bridge.  We first went there in Nov but were rained off.  This time we hurried past the furthest point that we reached in Nov, and on into our target square of NM7820.

The wood has a great mix of trees including Oak, Beech, Ash, Hazel, Rowan and Willow.  The first picture shows Pyrenula macrospora (with the white dots) and Pyrenula occidentalis (brownish thallus, slightly smaller fruits) growing together on Ash.  The second shows Pertusaria multipuncta on Birch.  This lichen has the fruits (apothecia) hidden by a powdery covering (soredia).
 

Also on Birch was Graphis elegans, told from the commoner G scripta by the multiple furrows in the black apothecia, shown in close-up on the right.  G scripta just has the central slit (sometimes widened to more of a channel)
 

A more cluttered script lichen is Opegrapha vulgata, known as the Scribble Lichen.  This was on Ash.  The grey-green Cladonia furcata was growing on a mossy stump in the wood.
 

A dead Beech provided some fungal interest, including the wrinkly black Witches' Butter, and this pink resupinate fungus which I think may be Peniophora incarnata but can't be sure.  It also had a lot of Beech Woodwart (Hypoxylon fragiforme).

Sat 6 Feb 2010 Taynuilt

A male Pale Brindled Beauty that found its way into the house.  They are on the wing from Jan-Mar.  The females are wingless.
 

Sat 13 Feb 2010 Oude Dam to Melfort

Another Seil Natural History Group walk.  We set off from the bridge where the road crosses the River Oude, and walked south to Melfort village and back again.  We had good views of many birds including Crossbills in the trees and saw a Roedeer bounding along the hillside.

We had lunch at a wooden picnic table with this Parmelia saxatilis growing on one corner of it.  Nearby were the bright red fruits of Cladonia floerkeana.
 

Due to the prolonged icy weather the Spring vegetation is about a month behind normal.  A few people had seen Primroses prior to today, but this Barren Strawberry was the first Spring flower I personally had seen this year.

The witch's broom on Larch was an unusual sight.  There doesn't seem to be any known causer for this.
 

This small orange fungus was on the bark of a piece of dead wood used as a step on the path.  Don't know what it is, possibly a slime mould.  Spores elliptical, smooth, clear, c 5 x 2.3 mu.
 

Though we were walking through conifer plantations there were plenty of native trees beside the track and along burns that cut through the forest.  These sported a good variety of lichens.  This is Pannaria rubiginosa on an Ash tree.
 

And this is Leptogium cyanescens on a Willow.
 

All photos and other content copyright © Carl Farmer