David Humphries

'Luck' that's been 32 years in the making .

Still standing and blowing both minds and bio mechanical perceptions. Really should share this one with Duncan But as Ali alluded to on the Arbcology FB page there is now extensive colonisation by both Kretzshcmaria deusta and Perenniporia fraxinea in between two of the semi autonomous units. We'll be looking to reduce the sail on this section later this year. What's particularly interesting with the natural bracing is that we can compare them with an image from the 1950's. The orientation of the front brace has lowered slightly due to the stem that it's fused to having subsided to some degree. .

Splitting triple stemmed beech that we arrested by topping the delaminating stem and reducing the remainder of the canopy by a couple of meters two of years ago. [ame] [/ame] The topped stem was finished off with a coronet, and habitat slits Today we saw both a green and greater spotted woodpecker investigating the dysfunctional wood volume. .

TROBI Local UK big trees from The Tree Register http://www.treeregister.org/pdf/Champion%20Trees%20native%20species%20May%202011.pdf .

So 6 years on from measuring the champion we took the opportunity to remeasure it today. Back in 2011 it was 25.7m today it came in at 26.7m So 1m height extension in the subsequent years. New team member Rob having a tight wee scramble .

Ah right, with you now. I've tried adding 'height found' to fungal data records with the British Mycological Society's FRDBI but it's just not the norm, as field mycologists aren't particularly interested in height of fruiting (not being that bothered would be my take on it) so only host, type of substrata and location tends to get noted in the record. Example; Fomitopsis pinicola, on/with Fagus sylvatica, dead standing trunk, woodland, 12/02/2016, England, Buckinghamshire, Burnham Beeches, SU95558534, coll.: D. Humphries, id: A.M. Ainsworth, herb.: K(M)203237, Notes: comm.A. Overall, FRDBI Record No.: 2081164, Origin of Record: RBG Kew 'herbtrack' + herb. K (full record data). There was a concerted effort by the London Tree Officers Association Massaria Working Group to include 'height' in the inspection recording sheet for the Massaria database but I haven't come across this level of inspection recording for other fungi or pathogens. https://www.ltoa.org.uk/massaria-disease-of-plane/194-massaria-inspection-record/file Would be interesting to know if there is anything out there. .

Sorry Jake, do you mean to star recording the heights of fruiting of various fungal species, or are you referring to where the colonisation starts from? .

Not that I'm aware of Jake, other than personal observations. .

Location .

Tom Williamson gave a very animated and engaging talk at last years ATF gig, I could happily have a few jars with him talking trees and landscape for a few hours hours if I got the chance. The man knows his landscape history for sure. .

Agreed, very interesting read indeed. .

We've been watching a relatively unusual (height wise) fruiting of this Ganoderma approx 8m up the trunk on this sessile oak for a few years. Originally thought that it was Fomes fomentarius (from a ground observation perspective) but on close inspection after watching it mature, we found it to be Ganoderma and now believe it to be australe. Although no microscopy has been carried to determine spore size, the morphological features and the associated cavitation behind the fruit body (determined by Resistograph) strongly suggest the wood volumes have been significantly colonised by G. australe. Some height reduction will be carried out to reduce the 'strain' on the trunk by limiting the impact of wind load upon the canopy .

Hypholoma species, probably H. fasciculare .

Interesting job Jake What % of canopy was removed? .

Got me interested enough to go look at 'all' the FRDBI records for australe on gymnosperms (had lots of time last night as I played football at the weekend for the first time in a very long time, so was at home nursing my bruised ego and bones) Andy O states in his "Southern Bracket or Artist’s Conk?" article that he didn't believe there were many/or any records of australe on conifers, I had a look through the 53 pages and found 40 or so listed as being associating with coniferous/gymnosperm species. The majority of these appear to be on various Pine species but there are also records of; 2 on Douglas fir, 2 on Norway spruce, 1 on Western hemlock, 1 on Wellingtonia, 1 on Yew & also 1 on Larch on page 16 40+ of 5381 is obviously a very small overall percentage but its still a fairly significant number. I wonder if the perceived low numbers are indicative of field mycologists perhaps not getting out in monocultural forests. .

Don't really know my Kiwi fungi, but it has the look of a large Psathyrella type species. If so, (giant leap of faith needed here.....) then these may be secondary to a more significant decay issue that's not presenting with a fruiting body. .

Excellent indeed ! .

Fibre buckling possibly caused by the brown rot of Phaeolus schweinitzii .

Has the scaffold gone up post failure Kev? .

Sounds like a fascinating PhD Dave, sometimes wish I'd taken that route. Thanks for your encouraging words, it's appreciated, though I'm still learning my fungi, its a sneaky kingdom it just won't sit still .

The canopy had leaves but the branch framework had a significant Inonotus hispidus colonisation and was shedding branches. The Ganoderma never really put on large brackets that I can recall, I'm pretty sure it was only ever that poorly formed fruit body. .

So here on this urban parkland ash, australe can be seen as a classic parasitic heart rot strategist (probably colonising via a mechanical basal wound) and breaking down the wood volumes by selective delignification and leaving behind its typical white rot. .

Francis Schwarze has looked in detail at the differences between applanatum and australe and showed (via inoculations of London Plane wood volumes) that the former is saprotrophic in nature and generally concerned with hosts that have dysfunctional xylem and in lab conditions couldn't breach the defensive reaction zone as opposed to australe (and resinaceum and pfeifferi) which could breach the reaction zone. Hence G. australe is deemed to be parasitic (as well as saprotrophic) Have a read of the link below for further details http://arbtalk.co.uk/forum/attachments/fungi-pictures/116928d1362903479-ganoderma-enspec-20research-20paper-20-20ganoderma-20on-20trees.pdf .

The last image shows immature spores which if taken purely on size may indicate applanatum, but these were in fact australe spores. .

Big tree, little tree......... Big tree, big tree......... .