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Country Sights and Sounds Each time we go to the woods we find another perfect location. This time it was a tumbling stream.
“Inside an hour we had gathered a nice selection of meaty Boletus, along with a double handful of yellow-fleshed Chanterelle … every gastronomist’s favourite”
Country Sights and Sounds John Shelley
Each time we go to the woods we find another perfect location. This time it was a tumbling stream that offered us a seat for lunch. Wrapped around with late-flowering montbretia and splashed with autumn sunshine, it was irresistible. We had gone back, really, to look for the Fallow Bucks, but had found such an abundance of woodland fungi that our attention was easily diverted, until we had gathered a good sample of what was on offer. It is late enough in the year for the mushrooms to put in an appearance, yet it is only now that conditions are right for them. All year long the microscopic threads of white mycelium that are the living fungus have been at work underground and out of sight, decomposing and recycling organic matter, keeping the woodland, and indeed the environment as a whole, healthy. Given the right combination of temperature, humidity and other defining factors, the fruiting bodies appear above ground. It is these that we refer to as mushrooms and toadstools, although really they represent a small and non-enduring part of the fungal life cycle. There always seems to be an abundance of the poisonous and inedible varieties, combined with a disappointing shortage of the few really tasty kinds. Nevertheless, inside an hour we had gathered a nice selection of meaty Boletus along with a double handful of yellow-fleshed Chanterelle. These latter must be every gastronomist’s favourite, being full of flavour and extremely versatile, the perfect addition to everything from roast-beef gravy to a breakfast omelette. Regardless of avoiding the exorbitant price demanded in the few shops that sell commercially grown mushrooms, there is something pleasant to be found in the exercise of searching out and gathering the real thing. A drift through a busy shopping centre hardly compares with a brisk walk in the woods; neither does that uniquely urban blend of carbon monoxide and bustle particularly stimulate the appetite. Once more we have noticed the extensive destruction of the larger and more colourful mushrooms. The deer certainly eat some, as do other creatures. The slugs even dine heartily on the Death Cap. Whether or not the potent phalloid toxins (that render this the world’s most poisonous mushroom) are accumulated in the slugs and thus passed to predatory birds and hedgehogs I cannot say, but this would make a most interesting study. The slug’s mucus glands are certainly stimulated at the Death Cap, as the large quantities of slime left at their picnic sites well illustrate. While some of these fungi are eaten, others are just smashed to pieces. Given that the majority of destroyed mushrooms are in the near vicinity of territorial markers I am convinced that the bucks are to blame. Their blood is up at this time of year, and it is quite likely that in their current state of testosterone-fuelled belligerence they find the overnight appearance of bright and gaudy objects in their territory quite intolerable. They are well equipped to deal with such things, being endowed with sharp hooves and strong antlers, both of which are brought into service during the rut. Despite the pawing of the forest floor and the destructive thrashing of small trees, we should not feel that these are in any way dangerous animals (apart from the occasional absent-minded excursion into rush hour traffic). In fact they are even too shy, so that any attempt to observe them closely is almost certain to be frustrated; the only view we get is of the animal’s rear end with its white flag of a tail waving good-bye. We could go and see them where they are enclosed in parkland, if we so wish, but isn’t that a bit like buying what appear to be wild mushrooms? The unfortunate deer find themselves persecuted from almost every quarter. Farmers understandably resent the breaking down of fences, as well as the nightly raids on their crops. Foresters hold them responsible for the lack of regeneration in native woodland. Sportsmen lie in wait with high-powered rifles, looking for a trophy. Others flaunt the law and do their shooting at night, using searchlights to blind their quarry into momentary immobility. And then, just when they think all is quiet, a none-too-stealthy tread falls upon a thin stick to send them into flight once more, this time from my camera-wielding self in search of mushrooms the deer have not yet knocked to pieces.
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