Pushing up Mushrooms

I’ve always fancied the idea of something growing out of my corpse when I’m dead; a rose bush, a pot of basil or, more probably, a nice silver birch. So I checked out our local woodland burial ground.

The difficulty is, of course, that you can’t physically plant people beneath existing trees; you can only practically access the spaces in between them. In a clearing amongst slender beeches, I found a dozen or so fresh-ish coffin-sized humps, close-packed side by side in a neat row like sleeping babes in an orphanage, or bread dough waiting in tins to rise. This was the only sign of life (if you know what I mean) and all disappointingly prosaic.

The place was carpeted with clover, and I was looking idly for 4-leaved stems, wondering if these counted as lucky despite the location, when I noticed the fungi.

I counted half a dozen varieties at least. My favourites where tiny grey ghost-like Mycenae with long spindly stems and almost transparent pale caps, held together by fragile gills so that they fell apart at a touch – real Tim Burton Nightmare-Before-Christmas fungi, perfect for a burial ground. But there were masses of fairy-ring mushrooms too, almost carpeting the floor, tiny white porcelain caps, some baby puffballs growing on a log and even one tiny, distinctive inkcap.

I shall return, complete with field guide and a couple of paper bags, for a good forage. Morbid I know, but finding an unplundered mushroom site is not easy these days, and I don’t intend to let a few cadavers put me off.

Incidentally, there was a clear, broad man-made path running through the burial wood. Then, abruptly, and for no apparent reason, it suddenly came to a dead end.

Symbolic?

http://www.rogersmushrooms.com/ is a very handsome, fully illustrated mushroom identification site.