January jewels

A mild and murky day but good for walking one of my favourite routes along the wooded slopes below Carn Ingli.
First off, we explored a small river valley where a pile of rotten logs promised interest of the fungal kind. The dog dragged me up and over a steep bank and we found ourselves in the garden of a house which I hoped was unoccupied but I saw a light in the window as we headed towards the way out. A man rose from his computer and gaped at us as if we were apparitions.

It's odd that robins' red breasts and  holly berries get so much attention in December but come January who notices the appearance of scarlet elf cups, typically growing on rotten wood or waterlogged sticks in a stream or soggy surface? Foragers do!  It seems the warming climate favours the growth of elf cups and as the species becomes more visible so does its  popularity as a wild food. Can't be too long now before we can buy them in punnets. Until then,  here is some advice of how to use them when you find them.

Pareidolically, I see the profile of a woman in the extra - but it's nowhere near as good as this fantastic trompe l'oeil  that gave a photographer a shock in the Peak District. Do look.