Lycoperdon pulcherrimum

This is my new best friend. It is a type of puffball.

My excellent hiking-pal found the first one, and then I found a bunch of other ones on another hike. They are tiny (at most an inch--that bit of rusty-brown in the background is an acorn), but the white really stands out (that is, if you’re spending most of your hike looking at the ground 3 feet in front of you).

I think they are so cute that they warrant their own private post. I’ll add more pics to this post if I find more.

9/26: Found more! Still just as cute!

More mushrooms, Sept. 25 foray assortment

Hygrocybe sp.

A Waxy Cap. This one is unusually pristine, as they are often wet and a little slimy so they almost always have stuff stuck to them.



I don’t know what this is, but I know what I like, and I like this.

Whatever this mushroom is, it’s about 5-6” across, and has beautiful ruffles and scallops. It looks like suede, draped over something rounded. Now I'm kicking myself for not examining it even more closely. What were the gills like? What about the view from below?

I have to admit that I often get so enchanted with the shapes and colors that I lose interest in finding out what they are. I probably shouldn’t say that out loud.
*Edit: I hardly ever do that anymore so I don't have to kick myself later.

Laccaria amethystina

This luscious purple mushroom is not very common around here. Too bad.



A young puffball, Lycoperdon echinatum. Before I knew about these I had assumed they were L. perlatum, but the whole surface is covered with short hairs, not organized little knobs like L. perlatum.

Another big fairy ring of Chlorophyllum molybdites (Green-spored Lepiota)

Someone got my contact info from a show I've got up right now, and told me about a big fairy ring by her house. It always seems to be a race against The Mower with these, but this time I made it.

It was big.

Green-spored Lepiota fairy ring

The street is over by the trees, and you could see the ring from there.  That black thing is my backpack.
 
      

My knife (above) is 3-1/8" long (unopened).

These are mature, and starting to dry up; the surface felt just like parchment paper.



The gills (which start out pure white)



The GILLS



The GILLS!!!

Lookit that! Like seaweed, or Georgia O’Keeffe.

When these are young and just coming up, the gills are lovely white (see here for another entry, of another fairy ring, from another time). The whole thing is white, except for some slight buff coloration of the veil remnants on the cap.  Also when they're young seems to be when overly-eager people decide they look just like the button mushrooms in the store, and since they smell nice and are so pretty and clean, they eat them and get violently ill. Don't eat these. Just look at them, and say "Wow! Look how big some of these suckers are! Aren't they cool?!? And growing in a ring like that!"