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Showing posts from November, 2019

Fungi of Kingston Cemetery

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Glistening ink caps The fungi in Kingston cemetery has been astounding this year both in abundance and diversity.  Glistening ink caps have been found in all grassland areas especially near the river. Through a hand lens a small crystal of mica can be seen in the caps which is where they get their name Coprinellus micaceus.  Downy boletes are located wherever there are birch trees and great examples have been found at three locations. They are popular with slugs and woodlice, so none of them has made a great photo. Brown roll rims have exhibited great burrows and tunnels. It has been wonderful to see the fungus gnats laying their eggs, or in one case appearing through exit holes as they take their first flight  ready for the evening's bat food.  The stags horn on coniferous wood which is probably from the bark chips spread on a grave.  A fresh fly agaric with no sign of a veil within the canopy of the birch  An another Amanita this time panthe

Autumn bats

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This Autumn we emptied about 30 bat boxes on Tooting Common. These were situated mainly on the great two-hundred year old oak trees, but also on the occasional ash and clumps of willow trees. Every single one had been used by an animal or bird. Mostly blue and great tits had used the boxes for bringing up their broods, but wrens had used them as night roosts (quite recently according to fresh droppings). Wood mice had entered a few (near the lake) and we suspect a pygmy shrew in the one below, where there was a clearly defined small exit hole, near the pink area in the photo.   In some cases birds will nest in the box bottom and bats can hang in the top, benefiting from the warmth of the birds. In all cases, spiders had used the boxes for breeding and we found centipedes, large numbers of two species of slug, woodlice and earwigs. Althouh we didn't find any bats but with the range of species recorded- it is more than likely- that bats  spend many nights within these solid