Jillie left, Jackie right

When I saw that giant shelf fungus growing at the foot of a small tree trunk, a tree that never quite made it to maturity, I must have shouted out to myself, or to Jackie and Jillie, 'Holy Toledo!'. A man walking a middling-sized black retriever whom I'd never before seen in the ravine, stopped to raise an enquiring eyebrow as he saw me bulling my way through the thicket off the trail to get closer to the mass as raspberry canes did their utmost to give me pause. "A tree fungus", I explained. "A mushroom?" he responded, walking on. Likely shaking his head at the silly antics of some people who think a 'mushroom' is something special.

Well, this fungus was special. It was especially large, a double-cone with lovely markings, sitting at the base of a tree that never amounted to much, poor thing, and I felt I wanted to take some photographs. Jackie and Jillie cooperated as they always do, when I stop. They stopped too, patiently waiting for me to finish whatever foolishness I was engaged in, before we could all go on to continue our ravine hike through the forest on a blustery, cold late fall day.

Earlier in the day I had assembled my puppy-grooming equipment and set to with the idea of bringing some tidy order to their habitual scruffy appearance. So I was feeling pretty good about that. Not that, wearing their fall sweaters, you could tell how well turned out they were, this day. I say 'this day' because it seems to me that they only look well groomed on the day of the snipping exercise and perhaps a few days following it, and then they take on their usual raffish appearance.

Jackie

 

The high winds we've been experiencing the last few days have completely banished all the foliage from the deciduous trees. They were colourful for so long and now all one sees of them is forlornly naked trunks and branches, all their foliage descended to the forest floor, and while still bright with colour, already beginning to turn a nondescript muddy colour as they begin to desiccate and form part of the mass of humus that enriches the environment.

As for the harvesting by the local beavers of the poplars, it's quite clear by now that no one single beaver could produce that Herculean effect that we see day-to-day; more poplars down of all sizes, well gnawed through, their slighter branches, twigs and dried foliage hauled off, the trunks either caught semi-horizontally by other trees supporting them, or lying on the forest floor, some of their bark gnawed away, but for the most part, they will be left to rot. Admittedly not throughout the full extent of the forest, but certainly in some areas that are beginning to expand; the beavers are on a roll.

If this isn't raw nature at work, what is it then?