Peter Roberts

At a guess this is dried-up Tremella mesenterica which is quite fond of willow. A shower of rain (or a watering can) may make it more obvious, since it readily absorbs water. Dacrymycetous fungi are rarely so ragged and irregular, wet or dry.

Ray Woods and Arthur Chater got me looking at a lot of Ramularia species last year (we seem to have a very pathogen-rich garden – despite my best efforts!) – but, as far as I understand, there is no true Ramularia species that occurs on Arum. Spermosporina aricola is a suggestion for “Ramularia ari” – but I don’t have the literature to hand.

Hi Matt! There are very few toadstools that typically produce fruitbodies in winter, but i think this is one of them: Tubaria furfuracea scurfy twiglet – a bit late in the season, but I noticed one in the garden a couple of days ago. The cap is hygrophanous, soaking up moisture, so changes from reddish brown to pale buff as it dries out. Gliophorus laetus would be way out of its normal season – but is differently coloured and very slimy, hence the name glio-phorus, glue/slime-bearing. It is also only found on old, unimproved, acid grassland such as sheep-grazed moorland.

Sarcosoma globosum is a wonderful suggestion! A very rare fungus of virgin spruce forests unknown in the UK – so not too likely in a Wiltshire pasture. This fungus is, sadly, just the collapsed remains of a puffball that has dried out, been soaked in rain, and probably frosted for good measure till it looks like a scrap of old boot leather. Lycoperdon pratense often persists in this way, but so do several other puffballs and earthballs. Look for it fresh next autumn.

Having looked at a lot of dune fungi over the last few years, I am trying to think what I would think this was if I walked past it – and whether I would stop and take a closer look. Somehow not so easy with a photograph…

I’ve decided I would think it’s Clitocybe agrestis. Very common on dunes, but under-recorded. More or less white, but variable with age and weather. Thin-fleshed. Not very decurrent lamellae. Almost completely featureless microscopically. Stipe smooth but initially may have some cobwebby mycelium. Best guess. If it’s not that, I ‘ve no idea.

Tricholoma species (which this is not) can occur in dune slacks with Salix repens creeping willow which, from the point of view of an ectomycorrhizal fungus, is just as good as a tree-sized non-creeping willow.

I recall seeing the Fomitopsis on sea buckthorn at the pitiful remnant of dune at Minehead – a thin strip squeezed between Butlins and the beach, but still harbouring some marram grass and a few associated fungi.

Keep searching the dunes! Interesting place for interesting species.

Don’t think so. The patches look like they have a distinctly greenish tint, not the chalky white of a Dendrothele species. Also a squash mount of the latter usually consists of compacted fine mineral matter and a few large spores. You generally have to hunt for hyphae and basidia unless you collect material just at the right time after or during rain. I often see these whitish-greyish-greenish patches – but, not ever having looked at lichens, I don’t have a suggestion as to what they might be.

Nice photos. Schizophyllum commune I presume – but a very fancy form of it. Normally a lot less pink and frilly.