At the top of the second meadow we have a little parch of Yellow Fieldcap mushrooms growing ( Bolbitius titubans) – the egg yolk fungus. It’s a very colourful little toadstool and quite surprising to see it because it is meant to fruit between June and October in Britain but then this has been a most peculiar winter in all sorts of ways.

It starts off as a bright yellow almost conical little head that quickly flattens out to form what looks very much like a fried egg and I read that this happens within just one day. The fried  egginess of it is very cheering to see but what is not so good is the knowledge that this is a fungus of well manured grassland – even liking to grow on old cow pats.

How that fits with us trying to get this meadow as nutritionally deprived as possible to disadvantage bullying grasses and allowing beautiful chalk grassland flora to flourish remains a rather discouraging thought.