* Where corals lie.

Time for a few more fungi before the season ends.

Today, two for the price of one. These are grassland coral fungi, so called because they look rather like the polyps of tropical marine corals. (To return the favour, some marine corals are known as mushroom corals!).

The small clump of bright purple fungus is the violet coral Clavaria zollingeri. It was named in honour of the Swiss botanist Heinrich Zollinger (1818 - 1859), who specialised in the study of the genus Clavaria.

The larger coral fungus is, I think, the golden spindle, Clavulinopsis fusiformis. The specific epithet fusiformis comes from Latin and means 'in the form of a spindle' - in other words, narrow at the base and at the tip but rather wider in the central region. I was rather thrown by the green tips, but I think that these are an artefact, the result of the fungus having grown through a thin algal mat which has adhered. Making an entrance to the right is a slug, presumably intent of having spindles for its dinner.

* You might enjoy spending a few minutes listening to Dame Janet Baker singing Where Corals Lie.