April ended in soft showers and wild storms, sunshowers and sunny patches, gentle grey drizzle and roof-rattling torrents.
We needed the actual water to fill the tanks and keep the creek flowing happily — and to fill my new pond.
But we also received bonuses with this mix of elements. The most striking were the rainbows.
This one had an echo, a fainter twin following it across the greyness of the watery sky, seemingly separated by a band of darker sky. Or is that an illusion?
The other bounty is what I have been waiting for all Autumn — the arrival of fungi. Only one so far — and a spectacularly beautiful fungus.
It’s large (that’s my gumboot next to it) a lacy ladies’ parasol, frilled and flocked, white with cream and caramel appliqués on top. I have seen this one before, although not here: Macrolepiota dolichaula.
Welcome!
Now the rain has passed on and the sun is out, I expect more varieties to pop up. I have my eyes on fungi alert from now on…