Signs of new life even in the depths of winter...

January 14th 2015 and at long last a chance to have a scoot around the woods to see what's happening at this time of year. You would expect everything to be well and truly shut down for winter, with little or no signs of life? Not the case this year, as I soon began to realise when after entering Comfort's Wood from the Swattenden Lane entrance, I hadn't walked more than a few metres when I stopped to look at how the hazel trees were doing and spotted this little fly...

I think this is Episyrphus balteatus, sometimes called the marmalade hoverfly, a relatively small hoverfly of the Syrphidae family and one that I don't recall ever seeing in January before.

 The hazel itself seems to be quite advance, as well as the male winter catkins there are already female flowers, which appear before the leaves...

I am still finding fungi in the woods and spotted this one which I haven't seen before and haven't managed to get an identity for yet...

This bracket fungus was growing on a coppiced tree stump that also seemed to be a favourite spot for rabbits...

There is also lots of fantastic lichen to be seen, especially on ash...

New growth appearing on some of the trees as well..

Some of the blackthorn is bursting into leaf already...

This bluebottle fly (above) was sunning itself on the ash along with a couple of chums.

I found a few strings of bryony berries hanging in the bare branches of some saplings beside the seasonal pond...

I wasn't at all surprised to find hibernating green shieldbugs in the leaf litter...

Palomena prasina-The Common Green Shieldbug

Palomena prasina-The Common Green Shieldbug

But then I came across something that you don't see every day, a hairy snail! Yes, I did say hairy...

Now this isn't the usual type of hairy snail that I see, namely Trochulus hispidus which is quite dark and plain looking compared to this one. I am wondering therefore if this could be Pseudotrichia rubiginosa, or the German Hairy Snail as it is sometimes called? I think this species is possibly more related to water and so I am not too sure but will try and do a bit more research on it.

This little caterpillar was my last find of the day and again, was in leaf litter...

Late November in the woods...

November 28th and 29th 2014 both turned out to be very nice weather days and ideal for me to get out and about in Comfort's Wood to see what, if anything, was happening. There's always something new to discover actually and even late November had plenty to hold my interest...

There are still plenty of fungi around in the woods. These little fruiting bodies were on one of the entrance gates.

Click any photo for a larger view on black

I'm sure local folk who walk these woods will know what I mean if I say that these ones were in 'the dip'. For everyone else, they were at the bottom of the big trees at the top of the little climb, after crossing the bridge over the stream.

There are still a few late bugs to be seen if you look hard enough and I came across this Green Shieldbug  on some bramble stalks...

Under some fallen wood I spotted a ground beetle that had been attacked by fungi...

A different type of fungi again now-this one seems to be attacking this dried rose hip...

Whilst I was looking at trees for signs of life, I discovered this strange looking insect...

This is a flightless, female moth. Possibly a winter moth? The females have no wings and their sole purpose in life seems to be the ability to climb somewhere high enough to spread their pheromones to attract a mate, then lay eggs that will emerge the following spring.

Back to fungi again; at least, I think this must be fungi? It was present in quite large amounts (this one is about golf-ball size) and had affected several plants...

Then under a fallen leaf I found this moth caterpillar. Not too sure on the identity of this one but it could be a Straw Dot moth larvae.

One more fungi to end this update then and I think this might be ear fungus of some kind, but I am no expert on these, so don't bet your house on it...

Cellphone snaps...

Today following a brutal morning of heavy rain and gusty conditions, the weather relented and we had some welcome sunshine. I haven't been able to add anything much from the woods these past days and so this afternoon, armed only with my cellphone, I set about taking a few late autumn pictures. 
I set the white balance to cloudy just to warm the photos a little as the camera isn't great and the conditions were still a touch murky at times. Other than that, they are as I took them...

Edit: A discerning viewer to my blog pointed out to me that these were distracting to watch as they moved too fast and so I have slowed them and enlarged them also-I hope this helps. They were only phone grabs and not really good enough quality to add as stand-alone photos...

Autumn fungi in Comfort's Wood...

I recently spent a couple of days looking around the woods for fungi. Well, when I say a couple of days, I don't mean literally 2 days solid searching-but I did visit twice and spent maybe a couple of hours each time searching for them.

I will post the pictures with an identity for each that I know, but that probably won't be a high percentage as I am not too hot on pinning down exactly which species I am looking at...

Mycena rosea-The Rosy Bonnet (poisonous)

Mycena rosea-The Rosy Bonnet (poisonous)

Mycena rosea-The Rosy Bonnet (poisonous)

Possibly:Red Cracked Bolete- Boletus chrysenteron (edible)

Wood Ears-Auricularia auricula-judae (edible)

Mycena rosea-The Rosy Bonnet (poisonous)

Macrolepiota procera-the Parasol Mushroom (edible)

Macrolepiota procera-the Parasol Mushroom (edible)

Candle Snuff Fungus-Xylaria hypoxylon (inedible)

The Fly Agaric-Amanita muscaria (poisonous)

Macrolepiota procera-the Parasol Mushroom (edible)

Even though I have marked these as  edible or inedible species, I am NOT recommending you try any mushrooms. You need to be an expert to be certain that they are safe to eat-please don't try eating anything or you could end up with vision like this...or worse...

More clearing work in Comfort's Wood...

Monday 6th October 2014 and contractors are busy once again in the woods with cutting back the overgrown areas beside the woodland rides etc....

This is similar to the 2010 work but with the emphasis more on the low growing vegetation than actually coppicing the trees as they did then.

I also noticed that the main entrance off Swattenden Lane the contractors used now seems to be in need of some work itself, as the gatepost appears to have been damaged, or maybe more likely, has rotted?

Back soon with another update...