Tuesday 21st September 2021 - Further into Autumn and Vapour Trails

As we move further into autumn we are seeing changes in the garden. The flowers are putting up their last flush of flowers, the fig tree has already started to drop leaves, the berries on the Portugal laurel will soon be changing from red to black, after which the birds will descend and feast on the juicy fruits, and the amount of runner beans the vegetable plot is producing has started to drop. The wire mesh, put over the pond, earlier this year to protect the young froglets from the cats, has now been lifted with a clean-up underway. While I was scooping out the duck weed, two pairs of eyes appeared above the surface of the water; I had disturbed an adult frog and a juvenile. We have an unusual fungi growing behind the raspberry canes. It’s a ramaria. I am not sure exactly which one it is in this genus of coral fungi – there are about 200 species. Ramaria are supposed to be common but I have only ever seen this type growing in our garden and on the edge of a nearby footpath, where it has not appeared every year, unlike other autumnal fungi.

Although we are continuing to keep ourselves, pretty well much, to ourselves, we are seeing a return to ‘normality’ following the continuing easing of Covid restrictions. We cannot help but notice the increase in early morning vapour trails in the sky, denoting the numbers who now think it is safe to fly, plus of course there will always be an element of cargo planes carrying, amongst other things, perishable goods. There was a particularly unusual vapour trail on Friday morning which had become thickened and looked as though it was going to collide with the rising sun, which it didn’t, missing it by what looked like inches.

Today’s photos are of our garden ramaria and the vapour trail, which just happens to provide another shot of one of our stunning sunrises.