Today, 6th May, I visited Baluk Willam Nature Conservation Reserve
in the morning, looking to see if any orchids were out yet. I did find some Midge Orchids (Genoplesium sp)
and some Baby Greenhoods Pterostylis parviflora. Both these are small plants, around 20cm high.
It was a windy day and mostly cloudy so catching a sunny break with no wind was like winning the lottery.
Image 9439 has a small insect on the flower of the Greenhood, apologies about the bad quality.
The Midge Orchid has what appears to be the pollinator on it, complete with a dollop of pollen on its back.
I didn't see these at the time as I was too concerned with the light and wind.
I took lots of photos of the midge and its crawling all over the plant.
Being autumn and having rained a fair bit recently there was also a lot of fungus about.
Particularly interesting I find the olive fungus (9649) and the purple one (9657).
For the afternoon I visited Sherbrooke Forest
and found lots of fungus. I always like the blue Mycena interrupta.
Image 9831 shows an unusual fungus that seems to have just squirted out of cracks in the log.
One of the paddocks had several thin fungi as shown 9856, though I'm not happy with the focus in that shot.
The fat red mushroom in 9866 is also interesting.
A lot of the fungi had quite wet and slimy tops, but this didn't come out with the flash.
