Tag:fungi
At the end of Mangalore Road, just off the Goulburn Valley Highway, between Seymour and Shepparton, lies the Mangalore Flora and Fauna Reserve. As it’s only 78 hectares, it’s not a huge reserve. However, this makes for a pleasant walk if you don’t like long distances.
I visited in early June as winter was just starting to bite, and apart from the quiet serenity, there wasn’t much else. I did manage to find a few teeny tiny mushrooms, but they were certainly few and far between. Considering it was damp with puddles, moss and loads of lichen, I would have thought there would be more. Unfortunately, it seems the other side of the Great Dividing Range isn’t the best spot to go fungi hunting.
Birding Hotspot
Mangalore Flora and Fauna Reserve is on eBird but barely qualifies as a ‘hotspot’. It has 156 species of birds seen, but to be a genuine hotspot, it requires 200 species or more. Typically, as is usually my experience, I didn’t see one bird on the day I was there.
Flora Walk
The flora walk at Mangalore Flora and Fauna Reserve is 3.5km long on a well-defined, firm track of sandy clay and quartz pebbles. Rated easy on walkingmaps.com.au, the track is a circuit taking you through a Grey Box Eucalypt forest with native grevilleas and acacia trees. In spring, it’s said to be a wildflower haven with the native orchids, daisies and Lillies flowering. However, the brochures say fungi are found in winter, so maybe I was there too soon. According to the same brochure, echidnas, goannas, and kangaroos also inhabit the reserve, but again, they were invisible the day I was there.
Amenities
The car park at the end of the road will take about four cars; from there, it’s an easy walk into the reserve. There are no toilets, and you must take all your rubbish with you. Dogs, 4wd and dirt bikes are not permitted.
In autumn, Mount Macedon is at its best when the town dons its technicolour coat. Just 64kms from Melbourne, it’s nestled at the base of the mountain that gave the town its name. It’s a pretty town of stunning mansions, boutique wineries, gorgeous 19th-century gardens and incredible views. The town was established by Melbourne’s wealthy elite in the post-gold rush era of the mid to late 19th century and used by them as a summer retreat from the city’s heat.
Due to its high elevation, the area is much cooler than Melbourne, and snow in winter is not unusual. However, it also has much higher rainfall than Melbourne and the surrounding area, leading to excellent conditions for the stunning formal English gardens, fern gullies and fungi in the winter months.
Autumn Colour
In Autumn, Mount Macedon becomes a riot of colour as the leaves turn and take on red, yellow, and orange shades. In the cooler, wetter months, the Macedon Ranges and the area around Sanatorium Lake becomes a mecca for fungi hunters.
This was the purpose of our visit time. We were hunting fungi and hoping to spot the elusive blue mushrooms. Consequently, we took the Eco-forest walk from Lions Head Road car park, a 923m walk to the lake. We usually take the Days Picnic Ground track but opted this time to explore the Eco-forest walk.
Macedon Ranges Fungi
The walk was longer than the track we usually take and very pretty. Mushroom wise, however, it was slim pickings. The first noteworthy thing we came across was a cicada exoskeleton.
Walking deeper into the forest, we came across several varieties of mushrooms growing along the trunks of mossy trees.
Mushrooms can be deadly, so a policy of look but don’t touch is wise. Unfortunately, many mushrooms are toxic, and it’s best to leave picking them to experts, or the consequences to health can be dire, ranging from gastro to death.
The blue mushrooms remained elusive. We didn’t spot one on our walk to the lake – so it looks like we will be going back to try again before the season is over.
Sanatorium Lake
Historically, Sanatorium Lake was purpose built to provide a water source to a hospital specialising in the treatment of tuberculosis, which was never built. Now the lake is a beautiful setting for a number of self-guided walking and horse-riding trails.
Visit Macedon Ranges
At the end of the walk, the lake is the small but beautiful Sanatorium Lake surrounded by dense forest and snow gums. You are usually rewarded with beautiful mirror reflections as it is reasonably protected from the elements. We sat awhile, took images of the lake and rested up for the walk back to the car park. Covid-19 and the stay at home rule had left us a lot more unfit than we anticipated.
While sitting there, I also played with ICM (intentional camera movement), a technique I like but don’t do often. As a result, the images take on a painterly look, particularly suited to shots of trees.
All fungi images taken on Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark II and 60mm macro, mounted on tripod and focus stacked. Tree shots taken with Olympus 12-100 F4 Pro
This week, along with three fellow photographer friends, we had planned to do some Fungi Hunting at Mt Macedon. So, we rugged up against the weather and headed to Sanatorium Lake at Mt Macedon. Weather-wise it was clear, with only slight showers, but it was 6C at the lake. Cold, cold, cold. That kind of damp, chilling cold that just seeps into your bones. Rugged up like Michelin people, we left the car and headed for the lake. The track was easy to follow, muddy, but not too bad.
On the hunt
We slowly walked along the path, eyes swivelling back and forth, looking for fungi and checking the sides of tree trunks and deadwood lying on the ground. When we found one, we noticed that there would be others in the immediate area. Never saw a single one by itself. We went off the path into the scrub in several areas where we spotted them. Some were just too hard to photograph either because they were inaccessible, way up a tree, or the tree was on such a slope that we needed to be mountain goats to position the tripods and shoot them.
Focus Stacking
I was shooting with the Olympus OMD EM1 Mark II, giving the new 60mm Macro its first real run, and trying out Focus Stacking for the first time on the Olympus, which worked fantastically! I just love it; it creates eight images at different focal lengths, then merges them in-camera into a single image (jpeg) that’s (theoretically) sharp front to back. Considering these were taken on a macro, which usually has a very narrow depth of field, it worked great. I can’t wait to try it on the 12-40 for landscapes. You end up with eight jpegs, 8 RAW and the blended jpeg. As I prefer to work with RAW files, I deleted the jpegs when I downloaded them to the computer and then blended the RAW files in Photoshop.
By around 1.30 pm – hungry and chilled to the bone, we headed back to the car, grabbed our picnic lunch and headed to one of the picnic tables. We quickly ate our lunch and then dived back to the warmth of the car for the trip home. We had a fabulous morning, we all got a great crop of images, but all need warmer winter gear 😉