First flush

... of one of our most common woodland fungi, The Blusher (amanita rubescens). The wet weather is clearly encouraging an early fruiting of quite a few fungi. I had a lovely walk down the river this afternoon to see what impact yesterday's torrential rain had had. Unsurprisingly, the water was high and fast flowing, but the paths weren't as muddy as I'd expected. I came back via woodland and meadows and found quite a few fungi, saw meadow brown butterflies and my first skipper of the year (small, I think) and a number of orchids, which I've never seen before so close to my back yard.
My broadband seems to be back to its normal speed. Hardly lightening speed fibre optic, but hopefully steady enough for me to try and catch up with my woefully neglected blip friends!