Oyster mushrooms have bloomed on a downed Tan Oak in our forest. This  tree came down last year and we left it in place in the hopes that we'd get these mushrooms - they grow on dead hardwood. Our hopes were rewarded!

And a Dyer's Polypore has bloomed too - not an edible, but beautiful to see and watch evolve.

The new polypore is the light-colored one. The dark brown polypore was last year's bloom. It's unusual for the old one to still be entact. These mushrooms are used by dyers of wool. When young they dye wool yellow or orange. When older, the dye wool brown. Their role in Nature it to decompose dead wood.

I have a photo of the first Boletus edulis, a choice edible. Four were found at The Sea Ranch a few days ago. But I am sharing it first with the Independent Coast Observer with my Sightings column. It will be out on Thursday!