Mushroom gallery

We've had a few on- and off-again bouts of rain, and the mushrooms are beginning to respond. On a walk into the woods, I noticed a flowering of fungi on the root-end of a downed tree I've been cutting up, and while the two different species form a nice composition, together, they're a guilt-producing organism. Any naturalist worth his or her salt should be able to identify them beyond my cursory, "The one on the left's a kind of polypore, while the one on the right is a member of the Basidiomycetes," the latter designation mycology-speak for "it has gills." That's pretty general—lots of mushrooms have gills—and at this stage in my career, I should have the species right in my neighborhood database. This year, of course, I've done better by the ferns and mosses, and I've made a stab at lichens. Next year, I think it's high time to make a run at the mushrooms—another run, actually. Earlier in this life, I actually knew more than a few fungi. Time to renew old acquaintances.