To get away from the screen I arranged to meet a friend for some exploring in a tiny pocket of the Chiltern - Mt Pilot National Park at Wooragee. Although we arrived with no set agenda, highlights soon included fungi, autumn flowering orchids and bursts of regrowth in response to a recent burn.

Fungi finds

We found fungi bursting out of the soil, popping up along dead wood and nestled between tufts of moss. We meandered, scouting the landscape.

Their locations and size meant we were frequently bent over, kneeling, or sometimes sprawled on the ground to admire and photograph our finds. (While trying not to squash anything else in the process.)

Spotting fungi and being able to identify fungi are two separate skills

Alison Pouliot’s fungi workshops highlight the importance of using all our senses to correctly identify fungi. It’s not only how a specimen looks, but how it feels, smells, its spore print, the sound the stipe (stem) as it breaks, and yes, even the taste or sensation in the mouth (advanced players only, please)!

As we were in the national park, we didn’t remove or damage any of the fungi but instead photographed as many details as we could. The underside of fungi can reveal telling details that assist with identification. We noted the substrate the fungi was on. A ruler and mirror help record the details for later when adding the photos online or checking identification.

By sharing these nature observations on iNaturalist they will add to the collective data on fungi as well as enable us to have our identification confirmed (or improved) by others.

As with other nature watching, you get better at fungi-spotting with practice. You generally won’t see what you’re not looking for.

Like elusive orchids, you can struggle to see one fungus in a forest, yet on stopping to admire that one you’ll likely find more, and more, and maybe even then find some in spots you already looked.

Just as with other species, you can increase your odds of finding fun fungi by knowing the conditions, locations and microclimates they prefer. But mostly, you just need to look!

Fungi weren’t the only finds of this visit

We also spied various autumn flowering orchids, the delicate flowers of a New Holland daisy, and spectacular shoots of regrowth following a recent burn in the area.

We enjoyed listening to the sounds of the forest (sorry birders, no details for you). We marvelled at the tell-tale holes and scratches of an echidna (or two?), the busyness and engineering works of various ant species and breathed the mild fresh air, with its hints of wet leaves and damp soil.

Oh, and as I use my GPS for adding the location to my photos, I have some extra data. For the competitive (Strava) types, prepare to be horrified.

My GPS reports we spent one and a half hours in the park on this visit. My tracklog totalled less than 1.5 kms walked, thus we averaged under 1 km an hour. We spent more than half the time not moving (photography!) and we were never more than 100 metres, in a direct line, from our starting point.

While we clearly didn’t tick the cardiovascular exercise box with this visit, there were plenty of other wins.

We had a lovely catch up. Yes, we talked exponentially faster than we walked. We found more nature delights than can be included in a single blog post, so stay tuned for another installment. We made records to share with biodiversity databases and we stretched our grey matter as we attempted to recall species names, natural histories and past seasons.

I highly recommend slowly exploring of a pocket of nature. You never know what you might find.