Look, Ma! He Brung Us Some Fungus!

I mentioned earlier that on the Mount Frissell hike I'd photographed the myriad species of scrub oaks only to give up trying to identify them when I got home. Well, on the Alander Mountain hike, I took pictures of some of the many and varied, colorful fungi. Since I had no hope 0f identifying them, I simply snapped the photos and enjoyed the show.

This first one was quarter sized caps with a wood-grain look to them:

Little banana yellow soldiers:

The color of a toasted marshmallow:

A cap like a sugar cookie. Hey, how come so many of these look like food to me?:

A many tiered shelf fungus with the color of circus peanut candies:

The color of an orange milkshake of the kind they used to sell in Oregon when I was a kid:

This one was more difficult. Perhaps the color of cherry candy?:

And ruffles with the distinct color of orange marmalade:

It's not so clear in the picture, but the real mushrooms were red and white, just like apples. They were quite common and every time I'd catch sight of one out of the corner of my eye, I'd momentarily think it was a partially eaten apple left along the trail:

Milky white and chocolate brown:

A pale yellow:

And a steel blue:

I don't know just what this reminds me of. A kind of squash, perhaps?:

Little lemon yellow fingers:

I believe these are called turkey tail fungus. If not, they should be:

The color of French vanilla ice cream:

I believe this is slime mold and it's certainly a pure orange color, as if someone had dribbled orange jelly:

These shelf fungi were enormous, easily the size of a platter one might use for a Thanksgiving turkey:

Well, as you might imagine, I was ravenously hungry at the end of this hike.