Ear Fungus!

  Nope.  I am not going to disgust you with some detailed information concerning a weird mushroom in my ear.  Instead, I will disgust you with the latest find on my hike.  The weather has been a bit on the soggy side for the past week.  Rains and high winds are becoming a thing of the norm around here.  I have a feeling that we might be in for a wet summer which suits my garden just fine.  As for now, things are wet but not so much that it is detrimental.  I am still able to putter about a bit in the herbs and take my hikes about the hillside.  Others have told me that it is quite impossible to even get in their gardens due to the water.  I am fortunate to live on a high hill where the rains drain right down into the Bayou.

  Mark joined me for a hike about the hillside late this afternoon. The day had been spent mostly inside doing tedious housework and I was going a bit stir crazy.  I needed air!  Our hike took the usual course down the board path to the pier then back around the Bayou to the peach trees.  We always revel in viewing the blossoms.  Just behind the canebrake, I paused long enough to examine a downed limb.   The winds had knocked down another limb from one of the Black Gum trees. This particular limb was covered with fungus.  Tree Ear Fungus, Wood Fungus or slimy, ooey, gooey, icky stuff coated the dead limb and is a sure sign that rains have been occurring.  These wiggly fungi are sort of like Mother Nature's own rain gauge.  Only during rains are they the jelly-like blobs.  Most of the time they are sort of dry and rubbery but once they are pelted with raindrops, they become quite squishy. Those raindrops are absorbed and the fungi swell with the moisture. These are just one of the many Jelly Fungi.  They come in all colors and shapes but all have the same wiggly-jiggly quality that gives them their name.  

  Mark and I continued on our hike but nothing interested me as much as the Ear Fungus.  The name, itself, has a rather unpalatable ring to it but these are supposedly edible.  Hmmm.  I have not been brave enough to taste one.  Maybe someday, just not today.