Watching Trees and Fungi in the Dells

The larch I'm sturying for Tree Following is turning yellow only slowly compared to some other larches I've seen, it's starting to lose its needles though.  (The larch is the only type of conifer to lose its needles in winter).

The larch tree stands on one side of the Water of Leith Walkway in Colinton Dell. Its roots spread to the other side of the path and poke through the soil in the side path into the field. At the moment there's a nice lot of what I think are brown bell cap toadstools growing just by the roots of the larch.

Not far from the larch but on the oppsite bank of the river there's a lovely patch of hairy stereum fungus growing on a branch of a hornbeam tree

this fungus normally grows on fallen trees and it was nice this time to be able to take the photo below which shows the underside of the fungus

The grey squirrels throughout the Dells were very lively today, chasing each other and running round. There were a good number of birds around too, and it was specially nice to see a grey wagtail and a pair of goldcrests. I also had a lovely view of a dipper.

For Nature Notes

As ever, red text contains hyperlinks and takes you to other websites where you can find out more