Fungus Among Us

On our hike last Friday, I was fascinated by all the mushrooms and other fungus forms we saw in the woods. I stopped to snap photos of a few of them. So many different colors and shapes!

 This one had to be a good 6" in diameter.

 Classic mushroom shape - I love the lacy effect.

 Growing out of the end of a log - so delicate and white.

 A whole family of brown mushrooms.

 This one looked like it wanted to be a golf ball. Just that size and shape.

 Another classic toadstool - smooth and shiny brown.

 These were tiny and delicate - growing out of a log.

 More log-growers - even smaller than before.

 And these were the tiniest log-growers of all! Still in the classic mushroom shape.

 We included Mark's book in this photo to give a sense of scale.

Did some critter take a couple of chomps out of this bad boy? 

 This one looked like white broccoli.

 This one had tipped over, but the colors were beautiful.

Was that a part of decomposition for this guy?

 More of the white broccoli fungi.

 Aren't these cute? Little acorn hats.

 More of the delicate little white ones on a log.

 White mushrooms, white leaves...it was all so pretty.

 Another still-life...conk on the log + a maple leaf.

Almost back to the car, we saw this one. It's very black and upside down.

It's bigger than my boot.

It wants to take over Portland.

The moral of the story, dear readers...be careful!
There are fungus among us!

(Sorry, I couldn't resist saying that again. I've been wanting to say that ever since the hike on Friday. But truly...isn't it amazing that we so so many different kinds of musher-folk in just 4 miles of trail? I was impressed, and I hope that you are, too.