Mushrooms under a Virginia Pine

Such a nice morning to hike! The pipeline guys are finally gone, thank goodness, and they've taken all their heavy equipment away. What they left is a wide, very packed track to walk on, and a whole bale of hay waiting to be spread over the far bank of Meetinghouse Creek. I picked up several pieces of orange twine and sprinkled the remains of another bale along the closer creek bank. If they don't come back to finish the job in the next couple days, I'll probably do it. The hay really does help hold the grass seed they threw out, and the grass helps hold the soil.

Radu, Daisy, and I hiked back to a piney stretch of woods between two pipelines and settled under the trees - mostly Virginia Pines with various hardwoods here and there. The dogs, never completely settled for very long, soon hopped up to chase a scent into the field and then the far woods near Lawson's Fork. The clouds were heavy, the air damp from the past few days' bit of rain. Once I was sitting I noticed that all around me in the woods were tiny mushrooms rising from the ground. Some were 1/4 the size of my pinky nail. The larger ones were about thumb nail size. They were white, buff, gray, brown - all neutral, natural colors that helped them blend with the pine tree and leaf litter. I didn't see the two I drew until after I sat down.

The woods were very quiet while I was drawing. So quiet that I started hearing the soft clicks of falling leaves as they hit the ground. Click - Click - Click A wild grape leaf landed beside me. Click It was yellow with brown spots. After about thirty minutes there was more activity around and about, beginning with a crow calling his friends together. His, "CAW! CAW!" soon led to a convention-style gathering of crows. Other bird and insect sounds were identifiable as well, as were human made ones. All are listed on the journal page.