Day 154: You could fit several Bird's-Nest fungi in the space it takes to spell out "Nidula niveotomentosa" on the page, and a dozen would just about cover a penny. These tiny mycological marvels are not uncommon in the Pacific Northwest, but they are easy to overlook. Each little cup contains twenty or more "eggs," spore-filled peridioles the size of a zero in a penny's date. In this species, rain assists in transporting the peridioles. If you look in the space of lighter wood to the left of Lincoln's head, you will see one which has been washed out of the cup. Another lies in a line with and to the right of the date, just below a patch of grey-green lichen.
I discovered these specimens along the Upper Elk Spur trail while I was out on my morning walk under light rain. I was unable to get a good picture of them with the little point-and-shoot I carry on my belt, so when I got home an hour or so later, I packed up the good camera and tripod and drove back up to the trailhead. As luck would have it, that was when the forecast of "heavy rain" proved itself by coming down in buckets, helping those teeny-tiny peridioles in their search for new real estate.
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