Winter colour

I'm sticking to the fungal theme for now.  We have few flowers to provide winter colour at the moment, but we do have the fruiting bodies of several fungi.  I found these four  common rotters in the log pile in my garden.

 

 

The most colourful is the Yellow Brain fungus Tremella mesenterica.

 

 Then we have Coral Spot, Nectria cinnabarina.  When this appears on my hazel beansticks I know it is time to replace them.

 

The next two also grow on dead wood, helping to tidy up the place by turning fallen branches back into soil.  Unfortunately they don't have English names yet.  This is Cylindrobasidium evolvens.  It starts off as a pure white crust and then develops a pinky-ochre tinge as the surface gets warty.

 

And number four is the delicately mauve crust of

Peniophora lycii, which slowly and carefully paints the surface of dead sticks.