Anne Elliott's photos with the keyword: Marasmiaceae

Tiny world on a leaf

11 Sep 2010 217
Funny, just got to thinking, how these delicate stalks support the weight of the teeny caps - such an extreme to the Twin Towers of 9/11. Remembering all the precious victims and their families and friends, who have suffered immense sorrow since the horrific events in each of the places that were attacked. Our thoughts are with you all. Love these teeny mushrooms that grow on dead leaves. I suspect they are a different species from all the very tiny white fungi that grow up out of dead leaf material, but seem to be more firmly "rooted" to something. Found these ones growing at Brown-Lowery Provincial Park on 7th September. They may have been around half an inch tall. Oh, and I noticed an empty casing from some kind of insect on the leaf, behind the mushrooms. Will post a macro shot of it sometime. Thanks, Doug, for the ID - Marasmius! A day of mixed weather today. Was out all morning for a birding walk in Fish Creek Park - Sikome and Bow Valley Ranche areas. Decided I would go to the far western end of the park straight afterwards, though I had a feeling that this decision was against my better judgement. Nothing like a short hail storm to make mushroom photography impossible, LOL! In between hail and rain, I did manage to shoot a couple of Wolf Spiders - there's nothing like making eye contact with these through my macro lens, ha! Also a bit of Wolf's Milk Slime and a small variety of fungi. Everywhere was very muddy and slippery. Was the same out at Brown-Lowery Provincial Park yesterday afternoon - the trails there are just one mass of tree roots and when these get really wet, they can be treacherously slippery. It was kind of funny, as I was down on the ground photographing "you know what" and when I turned around I noticed a man standing on the path a short distance away. I told him that he had scared me to death, and he told me that he had called out "Hello" five times so that I would know he was there, but thought I must be hard of hearing. I'm not (for which I'm truly thankful), but I guess I was completely in my "own little world", ha. We walked the loop back to the parking lot and, despite the fact that this was a birder, he ended up getting a "crash course" in fungi - very patiently! Nice to have company, as usually I'm there on my own : ) By the way, it turned out that we do have some mutual friends and aquaintances.

In a tiny world

16 Jan 2010 237
These were the tiniest of mushrooms, growing on a small, dead leaf at Bebo Grove on 28th August. They always amaze me when I see how tiny these fungi are. Was out on a full-day driving trip east of the city today (I wasn't driving), to check out what birds were to be seen. It has been a gorgeous day today, sunny and comparatively mild (around 3C?). We did see six beautiful Snowy Owls, though all of them were SOOO far away - no use for photos. The pure white males were just dazzling in the bright sunshine. Also saw about 30 Eurasion Collared Doves in flight.