Working in my office I am rather insulated from the weather. Can't hear the wind or rain or see the sun, this is a long way to say that there isn't a window. Not to complain, it is a very comfortable closet and I don't get distracted by an external view.

I knew it wet (total rain fall was 3.07 inches ), I had been outside a few times during the day, but the wind didn't start in any kind of serious way until after I had settled in my office for the evening.
Leaving the dock was a bit of a problem, actually it wasn't leaving the dock, but getting turned around by the wind in the space between dock and rocks. There isn't alot of room there. I was thinking about just backing out, but decided that I could work my way around.

The wind hadn't built any waves to speak of, but there were white caps. The waves were low, almost flattened by the strong southeasterly wind. I thought that the wave height might increase as I went out toward Morne Island, so I went around the west of Breast island, what I call the Lighthouse way. I was also a bit concerned about plowing right into such a strong wind., I would need to go at a higher speed than I was comfortable with in the dark, as it was I had a tough time keeping the bow down so that the wind couldn't push it around. I had to slow down a number of times as the bow was getting turned by the gusts.
Had to turn the flood light off because it was raining so hard the light was just bouncing around obscruing everything outside the blur of light. I couldn't see the islands that I was steering around until I turned off the light.
Steering was a very active job, particularly once around Breast island. Keeping a given direction was a bit of a challenge and I was very happy that the engine cooperated. It was easy to imagine that the skiff would end up at the airport or on a beach at Kruzof in a very short time without power.

Getting into the stall at the dock was kind of a challenge, in fact slowing down enough to feel comfortable going between the dock and rock, also meant that the skiff was pushed closer to the rock than was comfortable. Decided after the second try to tie up at a spot that the wind would work with me rather than against me. Tied up the rather heavy fiberglass double kayak to the bull rail. Apparently the kayak isn't heavy enough to keep it from getting scooted across the dock.

There weren't many branches on the trail and I didn't feel compelled to run through the woods. I did hear one large crack, I assume that it was a branch.
At home the windows were flexing during the big gusts and there was a good breeze blowing through the one window that was redone in a less than adequate fashion.

The anemometer at home measured the following gusts: 52 mph 8:45 pm, 57 mph 9:25pm and
67 mph gust at 10pm. The airport measured a gust of 62mph. Looks like there were 3 gusts of similar energy between 10 and 11pm. I found a summary of the weather recorded at the airport. Yesterday's weather
On the walk to the dock this morning found 3 small (up to 16 inches dbh) dead trees across the trail. One of the trees was pretty close to where I heard the cracking sound last night.

	12/23/2008	12/24/2008	12/26/2008	12/27/2008	12/30/2008
Double Crested Cormrant		1			1
Pelagic Cormorant		2		1
Great Blue Heron			1
Mallard		3
Long-Tail Duck		3			4
Surf Scoter			23	7	8
White-winged Scoter		7
Barrow's Goldeneye	8	26	1		6
Bufflehead					7
Common Merganser				2
Mew Gull		2		1	6
Glaucous-winged Gull			3	2	2
Gull spp	2		6
Marbled Murrelet		10		1
Belted Kingfisher		1
Song Sparrow				1
Bald Eagle			3		2
Raven			2		1
weather etc	dark (8am), snowing hard	calm, west swell, 1pm	calm, 3pm	calm, 11am, some snow	very rough

The count on the 24th was a on a variation of the regular route. I went around the west side of Breast island (found the White-winged scoters) then dropped Deirdre off at the Litman's dock before returning to the main dock. The 10 marbled murrelets were on the east side of Galankin near Katz island.

january 1

Deirdre and I hiked from Herring Cove to Beaver Lake on January 1st. It was sunny and rather cold (max temperture 25F), and we had a late start so didn't often stop walking to look around. The trail was pretty quiet in terms of both people and birds. Did hear kinglets and chickadees in the canopy and crossed paths with two other groups of people. The trail was a bit icy in places, but most of it was crunchy snow which made walking relatively easy.
Picked up a lichen from one of the alders along the trail near the avalanche area. It is greyish green with soredia scattered over the surface. The lower surface isn't uniform in texture, there are areas without a lower cortex, a few rhizines and some tomentum. The lichen greens up nicely when wet. I haven't really taken the time to identify it with any degree of confidence yet.

We walked up to the lake and turned around, neither of us were too interested in walking the road back to the car. We had seen one dipper in the small creek at the beginning of the trail on the way up the trail. Didn't stop to look at it closely, just noticed it was there. On the way back down Deirdre and I noticed the ice on the small cascade, went to take a closer look and aroused 2 dippers. There was much scolding and both flew a short distance away. I did manage to get a photo. Not a brillant one, but what is more noticable in the larger version of this photo, is the yellow beak. I wouldn't have noticed the color of the beak without having taken the photo, so I guess it might be worthwhile hauling a camera around.

The yellow beak is characteristic of juvenile birds. Sibley 's Guide to the birds of North America says that the young of the year birds acquire adult characteristics by fall, if this is true for this area, this bird is woefully behind.

I haven't been able to find much more information about bill color in dippers, so well have to do so more careful observing. I really don't know if this bird was unusual or not.

I have looked at dippers once or twice on Indian River since the 1st.

Saw two dippers in the river. One with a dark beak was about 10ft from the first bridge. The other had a very yellow beak and was feeding in the flats where I have often found dippers.

Deirdre and I were thinking about making a trip to Indian River falls over Christmas break, we didn't get quite that far, but had a nice walk up past the first bridge and on to the muskeg. It was snowing most of the time, we briefly saw the Middle Sister from the muskeg before it disappeared in a cloud of white.
Based on boot depth estimates, the snow depth in the muskeg was about 8 inches , in the riparian area about 3 inches and in the transition scrub between muskeg and forest the depth varied from 3 to 5 inches.

We were pleasantly chatty, so probably missed some birds on our way; we did see Winter wrens, Song sparrows, Varied Thrush, Juncos and 2 Dippers. One dipper was just above the first bridge.

The snow seems to encourage alot of birds to congregate below the deck in the tangle of wild Oregon crab apple, Elderberry and Devil's club that grows below. There must be a reliable or substantial amount of seeds both from the feeder on the deck and the plants. The juncos and chickadees that visit the feeder also hang out down below. There are ususally Song sparrows scratching up food down there. Went down to look more carefully at who might be there (after being prompted by the bird list) and found a few Fox sparrows. I tend to go by the yellow bill, but their color is more evenly warm brown. Found 4 more Fox sparrows around the island, one pair by the lake and the other by the A-frame.

Christmas morning about 11am took the kayaks out for a family paddle. Time constraints and approaching weather required a choice between kayaking and ice skating. Glad that kayaking won out, it had been a long time since I went for a paddle. The weather was sunny and not too cold (34). The water was pretty calm, there was a west swell which was small enough that it didn't interfere with using the binoculars. Deirdre brought her camera and didn't seem to have too much trouble keeping the horizon. She graciously provided the photos.

We started from the Galankin Dock and went west around Rockwell lighthouse. A pretty large flock of Common mergansers (25), 7 mallards , one Common loon and most of the Surf Scoters (8) were between the dock and the lighthouse. Two sea otters were just southwest of Rockwell island. They let us come relatively close for otters (about 50ft or so). Continued on to Ferebee Rock (I call it Cormorant rock), about 54 or so Pelagic cormorants took off as soon as we headed that way. They are impressively sensitive to approach. I'll count myself vaguely stealthy when they let me get close. Continued on around Galankin inside of Sheep island. A Sharp-shinned hawk was on the north point of the island, it flew to a tree on Galankin and unfortunately I lost sight of it. Also saw a Horned Grebe on the west side of the island.

There were 3 eagles (2 mature) in the trees on the west side of my lot. The Crows that have discovered the deck feeders were down on the rocks below the house (fresh water? mussels?). On the way to the Twins, found another sea otter close to the southern most Gillmore island. By the pass between the two islands (by Michelle and Roland's dock) found a few more Surf Scoters (4)and Harlequins. On the far side found Buffleheads (6) and a couple of Common Mergansers.

Went through the Gillmore islands back to the main interisland basin then Ian and I took a peak between Kutkan and Breast islands before returning to the Galankin dock. Found a few more Harlequins on the north side. The only alcids (2 Marbled murrelets) seen were on the return to the dock.

I lost track of the number of gulls; did notice several Mew and Glaucous-winged and one Thayers gull.

Made a first attempt to record a trip using Google Earth, the result is a little clumsy.

Also seem to have been cooking alot the last few days; one thing turned out especially good for a recipe-less creation. In hope of making a successful seafood pie again some time, I'll include the recipe here. Maybe I'll find this one.

Leftover fish pie recipe:

white sauce (1/4 cup butter, 1/4 cup flour, 2 cups milk (mixed non fat and half and half), 1ts salt. Added an unknown amount of tabasco sauce and lemon juice . Sauted 4 chopped stalks of celery and a purple onion until relatively translucent. Filled a 14 inch diameter pan with the cooked vegetables, leftover coho, scallops and shrimp. Sprinkled about an ounce of smoked blue cheese over the filling, then poured the sauce over. It didn't look quite moist enough, so added some cream until it looked evenly moist.

The top crust was a pile of mashed potatoes. Just before putting in the oven, Deirdre brushed it with egg yolk (beaten). Baked it at 350 for 40 minutes.

The deer in the greenhouse made it to the freezer yesterday, it yielded roughly 30 lbs of meat. The kitchen scale is pretty marginal, so I'm not sure how reliable that number really is. Cut 4 roasts out of the hind legs; the front legs, ribs and everything else except the backstrap went into burger. The kitchen aid grinder was rather hot by the time the process was complete. Kept the rib meat burger seperate, I'm kind of curious how it compares with the rest of the meat as it has a bit more fat included in the grind. If the second island deer is harvested, I'll make some sausage and maybe try to make jerky as well.

Snow, hail, thunder and lightening last night.

The cold, clear weather has been around for most of the last week. The morning of the 16th was rainy, but it was sunny by noon.

There is still a very thin crust of snow and frost and a nice thick layer of ice on the trails. The Rhododendron leaves are curled up against the cold, also noticed that the Cornus canadensis looks a bit on the dry side. The shinier wintergreen herbs don't look to be as vulnerable to the cold and dry.

The last few nights, we had a nice view of Venus in the west and even luckier, we've seen Mercury just after sunset on the commute to the island.

I was trying to get a photo of where the sun came up and where is sits at noon on the Solstice. I wasn't terribly successful, the photos were definately on the bizarre side. The best description that I have of where the sun comes up is east of the Pyramids, near Deep Inlet over a low moutain locally (perhaps ) called Eureka Mtn at about 9:30am. At noon the sun was just to the west of the Pyramid mtn and not too far above the peak.

The photo of Cross Mountain was taken from the upstairs deck. Didn't have much to do with sunrise or noon, but the mountains have been rather beautiful in the snow and sun.


Celebrated the solstice by cutting 5 Sitka spruce for the auditorium. 3 were in the garden and would eventually block the sun getting to the vegetables. They had to go sooner or later and at least at this point they were relatively easy to move around, as the tallest was about 12ft. The neighborhood had a skating party and bonfire at the Galankin lake in the evening. The stars were out and the ice was very smooth. Most were skating with headlamps which looked pretty interesting gliding around the ice in the very dark night. I turned mine off a couple of times once I was pretty sure that the ice was smooth. Interesting, but a bit on the scary side.


There were 2 deer on the slope north of the green house when I walked home the other night. They were starting to walk off when I noticed them and stopped. I tried the low whistle, they stopped and listened, then resumed eating after a few minutes. One is now in the greenhouse waiting to be butchered. It had already shed its antlers which seems a bit early, but I guess I don't really know when is normal.

The trail count of birds remains pretty spotty, I did hear and eventually see a Brown creeper on the 20th and there was a robin in the garden on the 21st.

	12/15/08	12/16/08	12/17/08	12/18/08	12/19/08	12/20/08	12/21/08
Pelagic Cormorant	3		5	4	1	4	2
Scaup				2
Long-tailed duck			3
Surf Scoter	12	3	4	3	1	20	15
Barrow's Goldeneye	3		11	7	1	35	23
Bufflehead						10
Common Merganser			12	3	5		3
Thayer's Gull	1						1
Glaucous-winged gull	2	2	3	2	4		2
Gulls	5		6			2
Common Murre			1
Kingfisher						1
Bald Eagle		1	1			2
time	8am	8am	8am	8am	8am	2pm	10:30am
weather	calm, cold, isolated skim ice	calm, raining	calm, cold	calm, cold	ice, calm	small waves, cold	small waves, cold

It's been rather nice the last few days, sunny and cold enough to keep the small amount of snow from melting. I'm wearing the giant, calf length coat, two pairs of gloves and a scarf across my face for the commute. It takes me a bit of time to acclimate.

If I remember right the snow fell on Wednesday and Thursday. The bayliner's fuel lines froze on Friday, that skiff seems to succumb every winter, fortunately the aluminum skiff remains functional. It took a good 10 minutes to untie the boat on Friday because of frozen lines. Swan lake was still open on Friday (finally got a good look at the Canvasback), by Sunday morning only a bit of open water remained. There was a bit of thin ice at the harbor mouth on Saturday.
The full moon was pretty spectacular, both at night rising over the Sisters or Verstovia (depending on my location) and setting in the morning. It set over what I assume is a peak on the north end of Kruzof, or maybe toward Partofshikof island. I thought that the moon seemed a bit larger than normal that morning, presumably it looked on the cinematic side because of not only being full, but also at perigee (221,560 miles).

The fungi are frozen. The only creature I collected this week was a Xylaria from a Sitka alder. Haven't dissected it yet for spores, some seem flat and divided like hypoxylon others were round like something different.

This week I left the house a bit earlier and the slightly darker conditions added a bit of a challenge to identifying gulls, so I had to make use of the gull spp category.

Common Loon	12/8/08 8am	12/9/08 8am	12/9/08 2:30pm	12/10/08 8am	12/11/08 8am	12/12/08 8am	12/13/08 8:30am	12/14/08 10:00am
Common Loon						1	1
Double Crested Cormorant						5
Pelagic Cormorant						2	4
Great Blue Heron		1
Mallards							3	4
Harlequin						1
Long-tailed Duck						2
Surf Scoter	25	16	29				12	13
Barrow's Goldeneye		18	27	18	22	21	19	18
Bufflehead						1	3	8
Common Merganser				3			7
Glaucous-winged Gull	5	3			1	3	2	2
Gull spp		1		11	2		7
Bald Eagle	2	3			1	1
Raven		2

The feeder remains popular with nuthatches, juncos and chickadees. Stood out near it for awhile Sunday afternoon trying to get a photo of a junco. No luck, but did notice that the chickadees taking off from the deck rail sound alot like a cat purring. I assume that it is there wings that are responsible for the sound.

Still have a crush on the Nuthatches that are visiting the feeder. They have been joined this week by 10 juncos, at least 5 Chestnut-backed chickadees and a Brown creeper. The creeper was working the trunk of the tree that the feeder hangs in.

Week Three of the commute count. I've been taking notes on the sea state, so thought I might include them here. What I have noticed is that the choppier the seas, the more ducks near the Galankin dock. In any weather most of the birds I see are between Galankin Island and Kutkan island. The exceptions are the Long-tails and the Common Murres which so far are closer to Crescent harbor.

	12/1/08	12/2/08	12/3/08	12/4/08	12/5/08	12/6/08	12/7/08
Common Loon		1					1
Horned Grebe			1
Pelagic Cormorant	4	2		4		4	2
Great Blue Heron							1
Mallard				9
Harlequin	2			2	2
Long-tailed Duck			2				1
Surf Scoter	3	2	12	27	8	4	8
White-winged Scoter						5
Barrow's Goldeneye	13	6	19	12	18	22	25
Bufflehead				7	7	3
Common Merganser	5		10
Mew Gull	3
Thayer's Gull				1
Glaucous-winged Gull	2	3	4	18	5	3	5
Common Murre		2
Raven	1
Weather	Calm	Calm	Calm	Choppy	Calm	SW ripple	Calm

There are still fungi to be found in the area. Mostly Panellus spp, Mycena occidentalis and M. epipterygia. Also fruiting is Guepiniopsis alpina (gum drop jelly?). The Panellus longuiquus I've found this week has varied from hot pink to grey in color. I've found the small white version of this fungus on Vaccinium parvifolium, Menziesia and now on exposed roots of a small windfall Sitka spruce.

Found my first Panellus serotinus on Western Hemlock this week. It was growing on two trees, both had numerous fruiting bodies of Fomitopsis pinicola. Apparently hemlock isn't an unusual host, I just haven't seen it here. Found a particularly large one growing on a Red alder. It attracted my attention to another alder with several Xylaria. Not sure which one it is yet. It isn't hypoxylon and it doens't look like polymorpha. I need to locate spores to use the key I found, but so far the perithecia are immature. Fortunately, Xylaria dry and store pretty welll.

Another or maybe the same Western Screech owl was in the commons this eveing around 5:15pm. It was sitting in a willow at a height just above my head (way less than 6ft up). It let me walk within about 2ft of it. I stopped and spoke softly (some very inane nonsense), then walked past. After I passed by, it flew off.

This week I skipped Thursday as it was Thanksgiving and I stayed on the island, should have gone kayaking as it was a very nice day.

	11/24/08	11/25/08	11/26/08	11/28/08	11/29/08
Common Loon		1
Pelagic Cormorant	3	3		5	4
Long-tailed Duck				2
Surf Scoter		26	22	6	7
Barrow's Goldneye			4	17	7
Bufflehead				7
Common Merganser				4
Mew Gull	1	1
Glaucous-winged Gull	2	31	5	1	5
Black-legged Kittiwake		1
Bald Eagle	1		1		1
Raven	1/

On the 24th I started to take notes about the birds I see on my way to the dock. Suffice it to say that it is alot easier to count birds on the water than it is in the woods. Most of that information will be presence instead of numbers and alot of the information on presence will be based on sound. At this point, the trail observations are still in my notebook, they may end up in a digital form this week.

First snow fell at sea level (at least while I was watching) this morning. Didn't stick around for long though.

Scared up a Western Screech Owl on the way home around 6:30pm. It was on the ground near a pond (or large mud puddle) near where I've seen the snipe. It flew up into a Red Alder and stuck around despite me trying to see the effect of a soft whistle. I'll have to look for feathers in the morning.

Decided that it was time to take better notes about when mushrooms are fruiting. Although I have a sense of which species I find through out the year, I don't have very good documentation of the phenology. The last couple of weeks, I've found; Hypholoma capnoides, H. fasiculare, Lactarius alpinus (1st photo), Hygrophorus olivaceoalbus, H. camarophylllus, Collybia acervata, Pholiota sp., Panellus serotinus, P. longiquus, Pleurocybella porrigens, Crepidotus spp. possibly Panellus mitis, Mycena epipterygia and probably two species of grey striate lignicolous Mycenas (so much fun). Also found a Psathyrella which I haven't managed to id to species.

I've avoided Mycenas for a very long time, mostly because it takes a sharp single edged razor blade and a skilled hand to cut miniscule cross sections of miniscule gills in order to look at the shape of the cystidia. The skill is a bit variable, but I can buy razor blades. The yellow stemmed Mycena fits the description of M. epipterygia. Another somewhat similar species is flavoalba. If I had Meltzers I could be a bit more certain as M. epipterygia has amyloid spores and M. flavoalba does not. I'm more comfortable with epipterygia because of the somewhat viscid stem (notice the debris stuck on the mushroom) and the habitat and coloration seems to fit epitpterygia a bit better. I've found it on well rotted wood (either moss covered logs or branches) in scattered groups and sometimes in fairly tight clusters.

The grey somewhat frosty looking Mycena in the photo was growing on a rotten conifer log. The frostiness developed as it dried. When wet it was uniformly grey with a striate margin. In the center of the rather bad photo of the gill edge, there is a structure that looks like it has several stubby projections. There were basidia with pretty tidy looking sterigmata, so I'm interpreting this structure as a branched cystidia. Could be wrong and I'll try for a better section later.

This one seems to fit the description of Mycena occidentalis in the very fun section of the Pacific Northwest key to grey or brownish species and their cystidia . The key led me to M. subcana, and a note at the end of the that species description sent me to M. occidentalis. The hygrophanous, frosty cap, striate margin, cystidia with blunt projections, and occurence in clusters on conifers are the characteristics that seem to indicate that occidentalis is a reasonable fit. It is hard for me to be too confident with some of these species.

http://www.svims.ca/council/Mycenoid.htm#n726b)

I've been keeping track of atypical birds that I see on my way to town in the morning for quite some time. Recently I've decided to count the birds on my way to town. I'll try to keep it up for a year. Most of the counts were done around 8am, the counts on the 22nd were at 9:30 and 2:30. The / indicates a double count. I'm counting from the Galankin Island Dock to my slip in Crescent harbor. I'm counting mostly the area of my path through the water, basically what I can see and identify without binoculars. I'm not counting gulls flying in the distance nor the eagles in the trees on the small islands.

	11/12	11/13	11/15	11/16	11/17	11/18	11/19	11/20	11/21	11/22
Common Loon	1									1
DoubleCrested Cormorant		1
Pelagic Cormorant	3	3	3	2	2	3	2	1	2	4/3
Great Blue Heron										1
Mallards										5/
Harlequin		3	3						3
Long-tailed duck					4
Surf Scoter	7	7	7	7	4	1	2
Barrows Goldeneye								3	2
Bufflehead								1
Common Merganser	2	4					1		1	1/
Glaucous-winged gull	1	14	1	2	2	4	3	3	5	5/
Common Murre	2		2	2	2
Marbled Murrelet	2			3
Belted Kingfisher							1
Song sparrow										1/

Started noticing the distinct smell of mink in the basement last weekend. The mink like to move into the rather large space under the house below the mudroom. They don't actually get into the house, but the odor is intense.

Cheap canned tuna seems to be the best bait for island minks. I've tried jam and salmon scraps, but their weakness seems to tuna.

This one was not that happy to be photographed or for that matter to be carried down the trail. Unhappiness was expressed by scrambling back and forth in the cage and by an impressive odor. emitted from its scent glands. Carrying the cage 1/2 mile with an unsettled mink was satisfying, but not necessarily a treat. This one went to town in the skiff and was released on the city dock. Last year I spray painted the tail of one captured mink to see if they would return and didn't see any sign of that one after its removal. Not exactly conclusive evidence, but I'm not fond of the idea of moving the mink further using the car or of killing the mink. I suppose if I wanted the fur for something, I might reconsider.

In other island animal news, the semi-tame deer seems to be missing, at least it isn't frequenting the common lot by the dock any more. I'm not really sure if another resident decided to eat the deer or if it wandered off, but I'm guessing that it is more likely the former explanation.

There does seem to be a snipe living in the commons lately. I've flushed it twice, once on Friday morning and on the way home tonight. Both times it flew up pretty directly, then dropped just as quickly about 100ft away. The first time I thought that the wind caught it (it was gusting about 35-40 mph). Tonight it was very calm and it did the same thing. I could be the vegetation that is dictating the flight path.

There are still at least 6 nuthatches visiting the feeder, along with an equal number of juncos and chickadees.

The Galankin lake surface is largely covered with ice.

Last year I half-heartedly tried to start a culture of Panellus serotinus. It was kind of a rushed job using spores and cardboard, I didn't bother to find a good container and didn't give it proper care. Oddly enough, it didn't produce anything.

Listening to Paul Stamets at Breitenbush rekindled my interest in getting this mushroom into culture and into a potentially larger project. Although it is edible, I'm thinking of Panellus mostly as an organism that had some potential use in local remediation projects. What started me off was the idea of feeding waste oil to Oyster mushrooms. In one of his lectures, Stamets suggested taking an oyster mushroom kit that was done fruiting, breaking it up and pouring waste oil on it as a food source for the spawn. I thought this idea (scaled up) might have some application for small villages in Alaska where waste oil is burned or shipped out for disposal.

Decided to follow through on this idea and ordered a Blue Oyster kit from Fungi Perfecti, the blue one is supposed to be more cold tolerant. It is busily fruiting away on the kitchen counter.

The other leg of the project is getting Panellus into culture. Last week I looked for Panellus where I had found it last year, but didn't have any luck. Fortunately this week I found a Red alder with a number of fruiting bodies. I'm trying to spend a bit more time on the preperation this time. I soaked some cardboard overnight, bought a small plastic container with a lid and peeled the outer paper off this morning. Following the instructions in Mycelium Running, I layered the corrugated part of the cardboard in the container and place between 4-6 pieces of the stems of the mushroom between the layers. I gave it a bit more water and added the lid. I'll keep the container in the mudroom of the house where it is a bit cooler, but above freezing.

I also started a few Crepidotus and Panellus longipes (sp?) in a smaller container.

Breitenbush Mushroom Conference

I couldn't have asked for better weather for hunting mushrooms. It was sunny, autumn warm during the day with crisp-cold and star-filled nights.
The Big-leaf maples and alder leaves were bright yellow and the vine maples red. The leaves were falling, drifting over the road both on the main highway and even more picturesque on the side road from Detroit to Breitenbush. I drove up to the conference center. The photos don't even vaguely convey the intensity of the colors.

There were plenty of mushrooms available in the area, most of which don't occur this far north, but there was some overlap in species between the Sitka and Breitenbush. I didn't nececessarily expect there to be alot of overlap given the differences in vascular plant species and in the climate, I was just hopeful that there would be more species in common. Still it was valuable learning/relearning some species that might show up here at some point.
The speakers were pretty engaging; I particularly enjoyed and will no doubt use Tom Volk's description of what it would be like if people digested then ingested their food (like fungi) instead of ingesting then digesting food. Also found useful his description of waxy gills as similar to hardening candle wax. Not that it is terribly easy to fill the gills of Hygrophori, but now I have a better description of what a waxy gill is. I had totally forgotten about secondary homothallism until his lecture. Instead of 4 spores per basidia these fungi produce 2 spores. Each spore has 2 nuclei. Kind of handy not to need to find a compatible mating type of hyphae in order to reproduce. He showed a great little clip of hyphal growth borrowed from Fungal Cell biology website http://129.215.156.68/movies.html, there are also images that can be used for educational purposes. http://129.215.156.68/images.html

His second lecture talked about common misconceptions about fungi. He used his grandmother as the vehicle for this talk "my grandmother said that if you cooked mushrooms with a silver spoon and the spoon turned black, the mushrooms are poisonous". It was an entertaining way to cover the subjecty, alas I can't use it as my grandmothers never said anything about mushrooms and my mother had too much of a science background to say anything too crazy.

Paul Stamets gave a inspirational talk about how fungi could save the planet. He was preaching to the choir and the choir enjoyed the sermon. One topic that was interesting to me was the use (and medicinal value) of Fomitopsis officinalis by the Haida people of Haida Gwai. The species doesn't occur on the islands because it is associated with Douglas Fir which doesn't make it that far north. Paul suggested that it was an item that was collected on their travels down the coast. They were apparently also collecting people. Nancy Turner's book Plants of the Haida Gwaii doesn't mention any use of this species or of F. pinicola which occurs on the isands. Apparently the myceldium contains chemicals that are active against smallpox, something that would have been more than a little useful when that disease spread up the coast.

His second talk was also pretty interesting, more how fungi could help our souls.

Dorothy Beebee didn't give a formal presentation but offered a hand's on dye workshop Friday afternoon. We used Hypholoma fasiculare, Phaeolus schweinitzii and Hypomyces (lobster mushroom). All gave nice yellows. I did learn that to intensify colors of Hydnellums one should use alkali (washing soda) and a little acid (vinegar) will do the same for colors from Dermocybe.

I took alot of photos of the fungi collected; I'm including a few of the interesting ones.

Cyathus striatus. I suppose it could be C. helenae (the latter has hairs in tufts, the former the hairs aren't in tufts.), but the hairs don't look particularly tufted.

Gomphidius subrosea: this was probably the most common fungus that I saw in the forest. It is nicely viscid, apparently edible if you like slime and mycorrhizal with Doug Fir. Since there was an abundance of Chanterelles and other more highly regarded edibles, none of these mushrooms were delivered to the chef.

Found my first Matsutake (Tricholoma magnivelare) on this trip. On Saturday morning, went with a group up the Breitenbush highway toward Estacada, turned on the Red Lake road and parked about 1 mile in. I walked up the slope toward the larger Douglas Firs. It was very open and dry. Saw just a bit of the white cap of the matsutake, thought it was a Russula until I could see the veil. The smell is difficult for me to describe, except as strong.

I found a couple of references to this fungus being associated with Allotropa virgata, a mycotrophic vascular plant. Seems that Allotropa is dependent on this fungus for carbohydrates. http://www.bayareamushrooms.org/mushroommonth/matsutake.html
Found a number of Larch trees on this trip to Red Lake trail. Most had turned bright yellow.

Auriscalpium vulgare

A saprophyte on Douglas Fir cones. This is supposed to be widely distributed in North America, not sure what type of cones it utilizes outside the distribution of Doug fir, maybe pines?

Geastrum: I haven't decided which species of Earth Star. Definately haven't seen any of these puffballs in southeast.

I didn't see alot of birds at Breitenbush, but then I spent most of my time outdoors head down looking for fungi in in one of the hotspring pools. Did see a dipper in the river while soaking. Extremely luxurious, not quite as much as watching shooting stars from the pools, but close enough. Did see a very tame Gray jay on one of the forays.

Seems that there are places in the Pacific Northwest where the leaves are red and gold and the sun shines all day long. I'll not dwell on the downside of this part of the world.

Dad and I went to Minto park in the afternoon. Many, many geese, looked like both Dusky Canada and Cackling were in the slough and flying over. I only remember hearing about Duskies when I was a kid, but then cacklers were just another type of Canada goose at that time. Found a report in the Thursday morning Statesman Journal that talked about Cackling geese arriving in mid October and staying through the winter. Guess I need to update my Willamette valley information.

Watched a Great Egret feeding on the far side of the slough. The yellow beak excluded a Snowy egret and the size and lack of brown-red seems to indicate a Great as opposed to a cattle egret, but I'm not totally convinced. . What was kind of interesting was the way it undulated its neck from side to side between strikes. The very bright and warm sun made it a bit difficult to identify most of the birds, but I could make out American Widgeons, Mallards, Coots, Double crested cormorants and Kingfishers.

Doesn't matter how well I know that the leaves of Acer macrophyllum are large, every time I see them I'm impressed. Gathered a bouquet of bright yellow ones for Dad.

Sunday afternoon the sun came out and the feeder was swarming with birds and I realized that I'm seriously smitten with the Nuthatches. At least it seems like obsession since I can barely take my eyes off of them when they are around. Being entranced by their chatter is another symptom. I think that I can recognize two of the birds; both are lighter in color than the rest of the birds. According to the Cornell web site the top of the females head are blue-grey, the belly is lighter and the eyestrip narrower. The juveniles are similar to the adults but duller. In the end, I'm not sure if the lighter ones are juveniles or females. After looking at the photos I've taken, I can't notice much difference in the width of the eyestripes of the birds. The belly and head color might be more reliable indicator of gender.

One of the lighter birds is much fluffier than the other rather sleek looking birds. The other light one is just as slender as the other darker or richer colored individuals. I managed to get a photo of the fluffy bird, but not of the sleek one.

Based on the dark head and the brightish belly, I'm assuming that the nuthatch on the feeder is a male.

Found a population of about 20 Armillaria growing in the alder chips in front of the flower garden behind the house. I'm sure that they are the same as I found there last fall. Last fall, I decided they were A. ostoyae based on the macroscopic features. The key character that lead me to ostoyae was the dark fibrils on the surface of the younger caps.

Trolling around Tom Volk's website I read an article about a relatively newly described species of Armillaria (1999); A. nabsnona that had slipped under my radar.

An unfortunately easy thing to accomplish. The clincher for this species was the interesting branching of the basidia. This wasn't a subtle character with a thin section of the gill, at least not with some careful squishing with an eraser on the coverslip.

One interesting thing about Volk's key is the absence of ostoyae. One of the questions I hope to get answered at Breitenbush this week is what happened to ostoyae. That species is included on M. Kuo's key to North American Armillaria. The key lead in the latter key to get to ostoyae is the presence of dark scales on the cap and that the primary host is conifers. Apparently it can also occur on hardwoods.

http://www.mushroomexpert.com/armillaria.html.

http://botit.botany.wisc.edu/toms_fungi/feb99.html

http://botit.botany.wisc.edu/toms_fungi/armkey.html

Continued to work on putting the garden to bed for the winter. I moved 8 5-gallon buckets of seaweed up the hill, brings me to 14 and I'll need about 10 more to cover the vegetable beds.

Also took a last swipe at the huckleberries just before dark. Didn't add much to the freezer, maybe a half of a gallon zip lock bag, but it was satisfying to pick from the last of the heavy laden bushes by the trail.

On Friday the 17th went for a brief walk up Gavan Hill trail. The weather varied between rain (often rather intense) and brief teaser bits of sunshine. I got soaked.
Collected a mushroom that I only had glimpses of last fall, that is when I found this fungus last year, it was pretty far gone. Last years' were growing in the bench muskeg in areas with alot of small pine trees. It was absent from the areas with abundant Carex livida. This year I found one rather chewed up specimen in the muskeg off the quarry road, again in an area with lots of small pines and ericaceous shrubs.

This patch of the mushrooms were growing near Shore pine rather close to the lower part of the trail. Saw a Hermit thrush while looking for additional populations of this mushroom.
The cap and stipe are a dark pink over white. The less developed caps were a bit deeper pink than the larger ones. The larger caps were slightly lighter on the margins. The largest caps were 6 and 7 cm across. The gills are distant, waxy and white with a bit of a pink cast. The gills did show some pink bruising, but I didn't see any with entirely pink gills. The stem was white at the very top, and the rest pink. The end was attenuated and most had a bit of a curve to the lowermost part. The largest were 10 and 11cm long and 1.5 cm in diameter. The cap and stem were quite moist almost sticky, but they dried quickly. I didn't notice any odor and the taste was mild.

I struggled my way through Hesler and Smith's monograph of Hygrophorus to subsection Camarophylli, series Rubentes; H. erubescens seems to be the best fit. I was tempted by the habitat to call this one H. capreolarius, but that species has darker gills. One subspecies of H. erubescens does seem to occur in bogs in Clayoquot Sound on Vancouver Island, so I'll stick with that species for now.

This mushroom doesn't seem to be as robust or bulky as what I've seen eg. http://www.svims.ca/council/illust/Hygrophorus%20erubescens%201%20Michael%20Beug.htm

This photo looks a bit better http://www.flickr.com/photos/23151213@N03/2525032540/in/pool-84638739@N00

The habitat reference was; Macrofungi from six habitats over five years in Clayoquot Sound, Vancouver Island
Christine Roberts, Oluna Ceska, Paul Kroeger, and Bryce Kendrick. 2004. Canadian Journal of Botany 82:1518-1538

I noticed that I decided this mushroom was H. pudorinus var pudorinus last year, not sure why I ignored the lack of a yellow stem base. Must have been desperate to call it something.

The 8 nuthatches are still visiting the feeder, they are pretty dedicated at food gathering. They go through whatever amount of food that is put out for them. Still wish I could get a reasonable recording of their chatter, but haven't managed to do so as yet. The birds are pretty tame, at least they keep eating when I'm standing right next to the feeder. Kind of odd for here but, the Juncos and Chickadees are less numerous at the feeder than the Nuthatches.

A Northern Flicker came to the feeder tree a few times over the last two weekends. Didn't land on the feeder or the rail, stayed on a branch nearby.


The Golden crowned sparrows seem to have moved on.


Seeing the Fork-tailed storm petrels most days on my commute, on the 14th they were in the channel between Japonski and town. Also on the 14th saw the first Longtails of the season in the channel.
The commute birds are starting to settle into winter mode; saw a loon with a distinctly yellow bill (I'm willing to call it a Yellow-billed loon) on Thursday and a Common loon on Friday. I noticed the first Harlequins on the rocks by the Galankin dock on Thursday and a pair of mallards on Saturday morning.
The Fork-tailed Storm petrels are around most days. I've only seen one that I thought was a Leach's. Other birds seen on the commute include: Black-legged Kittiwakes, Pelagic and Double Crested Cormorants and one Horned Grebe on the 14th.

Planted the local grown garlic plus 2 new varieties from Territorial, Belarus and Chesanok Red, over the last two weekends. It is the latest that I've planted it, so I'm crossing my fingers that it does well. Have most of the garden harvested and cleaned up, most of the harvest was rather pathetic, but what grew, tasted good. The Maria heirloom potatoes from Haines produced several knobby potatoes somewhat similar in shape to Swedish peanut.
On another catch-up sort of note, there was snow on Picnic Rock on the 6th of October.

Collecting mushrooms has slowed down a little, mostly because I've been busy doing other things. Still there are a few things that I've managed to figure out over the last week or so.

Camarophyllus pratensis: This species was growing on the lawn at Sheldon Jackson.

The cap is a orange or coral color with a somewhat variable shape. Neither the cap or stem are viscid. The The gills are decurrent white and subdistant. The stipe was also white.

The cap color, lack of stickiness and staining and habitat are pretty distinctive, apparently the gills are often the same color as the cap. In Mushrooms Demystified the habitat is either open or grassy places or under Redwoods.

Xylaria cornu-damae: on unidentifiable rotten wood near beginning of Gavan Hill trail. The stalks weren't divided and antler-like as are those of X. hypoxylon. The stalks were more cylindrical and all black on the outer surface. I wasn't really sure what it was until I cut a section lengthwise. The interior was white with black perithecia lining the margin.

The lack of branching, club-shaped head, minutely bumpy surface and white interior seem to be good characters. I'm not entirely sure of the species. The Pacific Northwest Key council key leads me to that species without much trouble and the description seems good. There is a note that suggests that X. longipes might occur in the area, but it isn't documented. Both longipes and cornu-damae are said to occur on hardwood.

Tricholoma vaccinum: Alice Island under open grown Sitka spruce. If I'm remembering right they were growing in a manner that I could call gregarious. Caps were dark brown with darker fibrils, not quite what I would call scales. A key character for this species seems to be the veil remnants on the cap margin. A similar species T. imbricatum lacks the remnants on the cap margin. The stem was light with dark fibrils and hollow in the middle.

The other species seen recently that looks somewhat similar is Tricholoma pessundatum. The viscid cap is a good character to differentiate it. The cap is dark brown black in the center and somewhat lighter at the edge. The stem surface has vertical fibers. There was a strange odor to the fresh cap that dissapated. A patch of this species was growing on SJ campus near the museum in a relatively open woodsy spot under spruce. The largest of the caps were 5-6.5 inches across.

Cortinarius multiformis: Alice island growing under an open grown Sitka Spruce.
Kind of an attractive mushroom with a yellow brown cap, slightly darker brown edge. The cap was slightly viscid when wet and slightly shiny when dry. Has a thicker cobwebby veil that persists on the edge of the cap. Young gills are pale. The stipe is pale with brown fibrils, with a bulbous base.

Hygrophorus camarphyllus vs calophyllus: Alice island on the gravel walk behind the kindegarten that leads to a view of Sealing cove harbor. There were several under Sitka alder growing on the gentle slope from the walk.

Kind of difficult to make a decision about this one. The gills certainly aren't pink as described as sometimes occuring with H. calophyllus.

Did another test of the Cortinarius phoeniceus var. occidentalis. I should use Dermocybe for this species instead of Cortinarius as it was described as such in 1989. I finally found a good reference to the section that includes the red gilled species.

Ammirati, J.F. (1989). Dermocybe, subgenus Dermocybe, section Sanguineae in northern California. Mycotaxon 34 (1): 21-36 that was available at the CyberLiber http://www.cybertruffle.org.uk/cyberliber/

One of the issues I needed settled was the difference between D. semisanguinaria and D. phoenicea var. occidentalis. Cap color seems like it might be a somewhat variable characteristic to hang a species on, but that does seem to be the main characteristic I could find in the descriptions in the article.

The distribution of the two species overlaps, but D. semisanguinarius is more common on the east coast and phoenicea on the west coast.

"Dermocybe phoenicea var occidentalis is the most frequently encountered member of section Sanguineae on the Pacific Coast, extending from Californis into Alaska. It also occurs in the mountains of the interior where it can be found in some years as early as August. It prefers coniferous woods, but also occurs in mixed forests of conifers and deciduous trees. "

Recollected both species of Cortinarius or Dermocybe from the SJ spruce tree, this time keeping them in seperate paper bags. Sorting the dried fruiting bodies was kind of problematic last time and I was curious if the species had been mixed in the dye baths. Basically could I achieve the same colors twice?
Mordanted some roving and loose wool in Alum with a bit of cream of tartar the day before the dye bath. Used 23 brown Cortinarius (best fit is cinnamomeus) and 16 Dermocybe in quart jars about 2/3 full of water. The jars went in a water bath in the double pot designed for pasta. I was hoping that the extra layer would keep the jars from breaking. Also used the dye bath saved from the last round of dyes.

The mushrooms simmered in the dye bath for about 25 minutes before I added the wool. The exhaust dye jar went in the pot about 5 minutes before the wool was added. I let the dye bath go for another hour, then let the wool cool in the dye overnight.

The D. phoenicea wool was a pretty nice rose sort of red, a bit darker than the color of the silk scarf. The exhaust dye (left) was a tangerine color (similar to the color last time) and the Cortinarius cinnamomus was a lighter, duller orange. The pink wool above the red wool in the center is unmordanted wool put in the Dermocybe dyes.