Jasper Sharp

“…all of this - every single job not created, every investment withheld, every percentage point sliced off of the country’s GDP, every food bill that’s been nudged upwards - stems from the single policy that Nigel Farage spent half his life evangelising.”

A brilliant film!

We seem to have quite a few spots in East Sussex/Kent. It might be because there’s dead elm around here, or it might have jumped hosts. I found my first in Peckham in London, last place I’d expect it.

Hemitrichia clavata slime mold fruiting bodies. They look like yellow cones on brown stalks. They’re frosty, and chilling with some moss.

When you’re cold, they’re cold.
Pick up slime molds you find and take them into your home.

#slimemold #myxomycetes #fungifriends

I’ve never found C. poroides, but Ceratiomyxa fruticulosa seems to be all year round in southern England at the moment.

First one I remember seeing as a kid - hiding behind the sofa. Not seen it since, so will be interesting to see what kind of impact it might have on me 50 years on!

Killer undersea rug.

It has gills so not quite like a morel, but lovely pink hue

One of the UK’s most beautiful mushrooms to my mind, the Wrinkled Peach (Rhodotus palmatus) is much less rare than one might think. I’ve found it in at least 3 different locations. As appetising as it looks, and despite its name, this one is in fact not considered an edible - bitter and rubbery.

Courtesans & Criminals: The Underworld of Hideo Gosha 2025 Subscribers: This is NOT included in your Subscription. If you'd like to purchase it, you will need to login to view your special 50% off SRP pricing. This special limited edition spot gloss

Proud to have commentaries on both Onimasa and Tokyo Bordello on this Hideo Gosha release.

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“A quiz question. What links these seven countries: Iceland, Norway, Albania, Bhutan, Costa Rica, Paraguay and Uruguay?”

Could be right. My find was near Wingham, and other finds have been near Ashford.

I think that’s Clavulina cristata, the Crested Coral. Personally not so interested in edibility unless it’s a species I know is tasty (ie chanterelles)

I suspect many of these will be incorrect identifications, as inaturalist records are unverifiable. But of course these kind of internet resources make it much easier to record species. But verified “official” records from mycological recording groups turned up nothing over the 150 years before this

It could be a possibility! The other example is Plicaturopsis crispa, the Crimped Gill, which was only first recorded in the UK a few decades back, but now it is all over the place. And it of course the Ash Dieback fungus, Hymenoscyphus fraxineus.

A schnitzel a day in Vienna with my angel, but now it’s time to go home.

It’s a good possibility that in the UK it went to extinct and then got reintroduced or climate change created a more favourable environment for it here. It’s still considered “rare” in the UK, but the number of sightings increasing all the time.

Indeed, in field recording the fruit body is the only real way one knows a fungi is there and what species it is.

Perhaps. We know that many fungi do not produce fruit bodies annually, but it seems unlikely that any particular species would remain dormant or unrecorded for 150 years in a country as populated as the uk. Global fungal distribution is still pretty much a mystery.

The sad thing is everyone can already see the dysfunctional world that is being created around us, and we can do nothing to stop it.

“If AI fails in even this simple binary choice, due to scouring the net for information that reflects the way questions are framed and then telling us what we want to hear, do we really have to fear being enslaved by something that can’t even sell me a copy of the Wild Poppies album?”

I hope so - just thinking how many hours I’d save not having to check my specimens under a microscope and cross referencing them against all my books.

That is one possibility. I guess DNA comparisons with the new records and any early UK finds in herbarium such as the Fungarium at Kew Gardens might help solve the mystery. Plenty of fungi in the uk have come through on imported timber of plants, as you say.

True, but this has been seen in multiple sites since and it’s a pretty distinctive fungus, which suggests it is proliferating across southern England. The question is why? Probably climate change.

Hope you have better luck on the Krampus hunt than we did in Vienna!

That looks like one of the more common Ramaria coral fungi - different shape and branching patterns, doesn’t have the coloured tips and is growing from the ground whereas Artomyces grows from wood.

Artomyces pyxidatus, the Crown-tipped Coral or Candelabra Coral fungus, was not seen in the UK over the entire 20th century, its last record in 1886 until a spate of recent findings around 2022, which is when I found this specimen (in East Kent). Where did it disappear all this time?

Very few mushrooms in the UK of poisonous, in the deadly sense, very you are edible either. I’m just happy to take photos! They are beautiful.

Not one that we see very much in the UK!

You know what species it is? Beautiful photo!