This morning we returned to Finglandrigg Wood, a place we last visited during the early part of 2009.

A post box for the woodland folk?

Our quest was to find colourful leaves, fungi and general stock images of autumn for the various websites mum and dad maintain.

Following the recent rain, the paths were in remarkably good condition, with only the occasional puddle of water to cool our paws.

As we set off from the car, it became clear that we were ideally suited for today’s challenges, as everything required was at our level.

For the little people

After five minutes we found our first unusual object in the woods.  Standing fixed to a wooden post, about 1.5m from the ground, was a pair of wooden boxes.

Autumn leaves and seeds on the forest floor

No doorway could be seen or hinged lid,  so dad started to guess what they were for.

He concludes that they must be post boxes for the woodland folk.  As they possess secret forest powers they don’t need a slot to post letters, but can magically transfer mail into the collecting box.

Acorns and coloured leaves

Scattered all over the paths are the first signs of the autumn leaf drop.

As the weather turns cooler, some trees lose their leaves and turn dormant for the winter.   Dormant is like going to sleep.  These types of plants are called deciduous plants.

Mushroom, toadstool or just fungi?

Birch, rowan, willow, oak and beech trees can all be found within the woodland all providing some great habitat for animals, birds and insects wanting to set up home here.

Fungi

Basking in the late morning sun, we came across this fine fungal specimen.

We had strict orders not to go near any of the bright shiny objects littering the edges of the path, as they could be really bad for us.

Charlie takes a little rest

Having spotted our first fungus we knew what we were looking for and it wasn’t long before we found yellow ones, dark brown ones and even small white ones. Some were even bright red with white spots, just like in the cartoons.

Everyone was kept some distance from the fungi and ensured that they did not touch, lick or sniff.

Fungi hunting is tough work

With little running water, in the form of paddling streams, it was a good job dad had brought the drinks bottle.

Buster wraps his lead around a tree

What little moisture that was around, had somehow found Charlie and had started to make his fur a little sticky.

You can just imagine the number of leaves that started to stick to him as he took a little rest awaiting his turn for a drink.

Not wishing to be left out from all of the attention, I started my own game of wrap around the trees.

Orange foam on a tree stump

An 8m lead can wrap around a tree a number of times!

Orange tree foam

Among the dark coloured rotting tree stumps, dad spotted what appeared to be one stump sprayed with bright orange foam.

Close up, foam looks like tiny eggs...

Set against the dark woodland the bright orange substance looked totally out of place.

Zooming in with the camera lens the foam actually looks to be made up of thousands of tiny spheres.

Mum says she is not sure if this is a form of fungi. Do you know?

Have your say in the comments area below.

Finglandrigg Wood is managed by Natural England as a National Nature Reserve.

Until next time

Buster and Charlie

With an air temperature of 13 degrees and white fluffy clouds in the sky we escaped the confines of the house for another expedition, this time to the north of Carlisle.

Our destination was to be the Kingmoor North Nature Reserve on the side of the former 14 Maintainance Unit (14MU) depot.

This is a part of the nature reserve we have not yet visited and will be subject to quite a bit of disruption in the next few years as the Northern Relief road bulldozes through.

We parked the car near to the Parcelforce depot and set off on our walk, eager to get our noses into some new smells.

Acorn

Sheltered from the slight cool breeze by the high hedges we soon became warm under the strong sunshine.

Our walk was on firm dry ground ideal for buggies and wheelchairs, although it was a bit narrow in places.

Signs of autumn were all around and mum spotted many oak trees with ripening acorns.

Green acorn growth was turning to a rich golden brown in the late summer sunshine.

Buster finds a sniff...

The last few days of cooler weather had certainly had an impact on some of the trees and bushes.

Lush green vegetation was making way for golden brown colours and the path was covered with the first falling leaves.

All along the edge of the path you could smell that we were not the first to pass this way.

Evidence of other animals included the occasional mole hill, the flattened grass and well worn route leading under a fence and the footprint left in the soft verge.

Elderberries and Hawthorn berries

I spotted a few of the smells however Charlie is the expert and he scurried down many a small track to investigate.

Mum was not too bothered with the smells but was interested in the assorted berries still available to the sides of the path.

Elderberries, brambles, rosehips and hawthorn berries were all to be found and like yesterday mum started collecting.

She did say that we should not eat any of them as they could be bad for us.

Overhead mum spotted a big bird circling as if looking for lunch.

Big bird

We kept to the undergrowth so to be out of sight and hoped that maybe a mouse would make a better Sunday dinner.

Could it be an eagle, a buzzard or maybe a big hawk?

The bright sky silhouetted the gigantic wingspan against the sky so we could not get a good view and we didn’t want to get any closer to it.

MOD sign

When dad looked at the photographs when we got back home it seems as if the underside of the wings is white and the tail feathers are like those of a hawk.

Our path emerged by the side of the entrance to the Kingmoor Park Industrial Estate but not before we had past some large concrete posts with the letters MOD on them.

This area was the site of the former 14MU military base and dad wondered if these were left over from that time.

Toadstool

Maybe they had been the outer boundary markers to the base or maybe MOD stands for something else like ‘Mind Out Dachshunds’.

With the path ending by the side of the busy road we decided it was best to return to the car via the path we had just come along.

It is always interesting how you spot somethings when walking along a path oneway however spot different things when travelling in the opposite direction.

This was the story when mum spotted this big red toadstool, or fungi.

With a bright coloured top it looked quite scary so we kept our distance whilst dad, careful not to touch it in case it was nasty, took the photograph.

Given that this path was well made and fairly flat, mum and dad discussed if it may have once been a railway line. They did not know however from where to where… The research continues.

The woodland felt very ancient and indeed we could have been in Middle Earth, especially as a Medieval ring, known as the Kingmoor or Greymoor Ring had been found here in the 19th Century, which is thought to have inspired the Lord of The Ring Stories.  However, mum said that the only ‘tricksy Hobbits’ in the wood would be us two….still, we kept a keen eye open for Gollum and Orcs.

Enough for now as we need a bit of a sleep after our expedition

Buster and Charlie.

Other articles of interest

Kingmoor Nature Reserve visited, Carlisle