AstroGypsies

What springs from the ground never ceases to amaze me! With the rains the forest floor has come alive with the fruits of the mycelium. A mushroom is the fleshy, spore-bearing fruiting body of a fungus. There are many amongus;) ha! I always liked that! Mycelium is the vegetative part of a fungus or fungus-like bacterial colony. They can spread for kilometres underground and usually tell you that it is a healthy forest.

I try and get some id’s from iNaturalist. I upload photos and they provide possible id’s and whether others have found the same nearby. It is certainly not foolproof but it gives you a start where you can read from there! The ONTARIO MUSHROOM HUNTERS AND FORAGERS on facebook also is a great guide to what can be, or not eaten! We’ve harvested our fair share of Morels over the years but now are curious about the many other edible ones. We are looking into inoculating several tree trunks that are down to grow chantrelles! Very exciting!

We have a whole new set of families down at the dock as well. They are facing eviction, sorry guys, but I want to use the canoe, but for a few days they can stay and scatter hopefully, arachnophobs avert your eyes! These ladies are quite large, about 3″ across and with all those kids…I sense a few Aragog nightmares coming on;) Maybe Hagrid could come by and collect them;)

I usually think of Fall as things winding down but life seems to be springing up wherever we look. The mosses are putting out new shoots of glorious green, brand new baby frogs leap out of the way of the cats and we are still keeping an eye on our snapping turtle nest, finger crossed, they will hatch and nothing has already feasted on them!

The last of the hummingbirds have headed South, the feeders are still up in case a straggler happens by but it has become quiet after the raucous roar of tiny wings protecting the feeders has ceased. I’m sure I’ll get used to this, I feel I should be preparing to head South, but instead, I will have to prepare for Winter. Wood has been cut, split ( thank goodness for rental splitters!) and the shed is filling for next year as well. The Loons are still chatting and yesterday, the first call of Canadian Geese heading South echoed across the still lake. Winter is coming, but not yet. I plan to thoroughly enjoy Fall, from the most tiny minuscule thing to that which is larger than life!

The aim of life is to live, and to live means to be aware, joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware.
~Henry Miller~