Handcross, West Sussex, August 2025
Happy Fungi Friday! 🍄
It’s that time of year when spindleshank is popping up at the toes of oaks that are not too healthy. I was in Handcross (technically Slaugham Parish) when I spotted my first spindleshanks of the year.
They get their name from their long and spindly stipe or leg. Shank is an old English word for leg, hence redshank the wading bird with red legs. Another interesting word is start, which is an old word for tail, hence the bird called a redstart.
Spindleshank is a species I’ve learned through woodland management. It often appears at the buttresses or where roots meet the soil at the base of large oak trees. Often the trees will be suffering root damage, almost always from human impacts like path erosion, roads, car parking, etc. so it’s something to keep an eye on.
In the grasslands and on a wood chip heap I found these large boletes. As per recent weeks my ID is for rooting bolete, which appears fairly common in the western Sussex Weald.
Thanks for reading.
Fungi Friday 🍄 
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