Octopus Stinkhorn

More exotic fungi - today I came across about a dozen of these Octopus Stinkhorn or Devil's Fingers (clathrus archerii) on the common. Although I find them almost every year,they are still regarded as quite rare. They are an Australasian species believed to have been introduced to parts of Britain as spores carried in the kit of Australian and New Zealand troops during the first World War. The fungi starts as a gelatinous egg-shaped growth out which the delicate red fingers emerge. These vary in number from four to seven and are covered in a black sticky substance (gleba) that has an absolutely horrendous smell of rotting meat. The gleba contains the spores. The smell attracts flies and other insects which then spread the spores. Five or six years ago I knew these from one site,where they were infrequent. Now I've found five sites and they seem to appear every year.