August 8, 2016 [LINK / comment]

But wait, there's more mushrooms!

Yesterday I wrote that I was pretty sure I had taken a photo of a rare "Dog Stinkhorn" mushroom two or three years ago. So, today I checked my iPhoto library and discovered that it was just a little more than one year ago: July 1, 2015. Jacqueline and I went for a long hike along the North Mountain trail that day, heading south from Parkersburg Pike at Dry Branch Gap in western Augusta County. We hiked about two miles, reaching a high point along Leadoff Ridge, where all of a sudden we encountered two bears that came crashing down out of a tree! So, we gave up on the idea of going all the way to Elliott Knob and turned back north. I had forgotten how many wonderful mushrooms we saw (and photographed) along the way. For some reason I didn't write a blog post about birding that day, even though I took a photo of a Black-throated Blue Warbler, plus we also saw a family of Ruffed Grouse.

So, for the second time in two days, I have updated the Mushrooms photo gallery page, adding mushroom photos from 2012, 2014, and 2015.

Mushroom montage, North Mountain, July 1, 2015. Roll your mouse over the image to see an enlarged view of the Dog Stinkhorn.