Amanita Muscaria, aka the Fly Agaric, is probably my favourite fungi. To be fair it’s one of the only mushrooms I’m likely to have half a chance of spying by myself at a reasonable (to me anyway) distance – the bright red and white spotted caps do tend to stand out a bit. So when I find them I am always delighted.
This young fly agaric stands proud in the clearing, its scarlet dome still rounded and scattered with pale bumpy spots (remnants of the egg like volva it grew from) like stars against a night sky. It looks almost too perfect, like something from a fairy tale waiting for a character to wander by.
A pair of fly agaric mushrooms rise from the leaf litter, their red caps peeled back to show pale, almost white gills underneath. The forest blurs into green light with blue and white bokeh balls behind them, while the ground is thick with fallen leaves … a stage for these theatrical fungi.
Soft of Sight Photography 