An ancient woodland on an autumn morning – a place of magic and mystery. The air is fresh with a hint of earthiness as shafts of sunlight begin to break through the trees and warm a forest floor dampened by earlier rain.

This is the season – and the type of weather - when some of this wood’s most enigmatic residents come into their own. 

Fungi are inextricably linked with our history and folklore. Just look at some of their names: King Alfred’s cakes, witch’s hat, scarlet elfcup…

They can appear overnight, and they can be tricky to spot, particularly if (like me) you’re more used to looking up in the trees for birds, rather than down at the ground.

Some of my first finds today are almost impossible to miss, though: they’re growing in full view at the edge of the footpath, only a few metres from Moorlands’ entrance gate.

They’re quite large mushrooms with beautiful, rusty orange caps, like a group of people in wide-brimmed hats huddling together. The Seek app on my phone reckons they’re spectacular rustgills – a fitting name for such eye-catching specimens.

Apps like Seek can be fantastic identification tools, but it’s worth bearing in mind their limitations. There are around 15,000 known types of fungi in the UK – more than five times the number of plant species - and some are incredibly difficult to tell apart.

Some are edible, while others - with doom-laden names like deathcap, destroying angel and funeral bell - can kill you if you eat them. As the wildlife on nature reserves relies on fungi for its own natural larder and shelter, I prefer to leave them growing where they are, treat Seek’s identifications as a useful guide that can’t possibly be 100 per cent accurate, and apologise in advance to any expert mycologists left tut-tutting at the rank amateurism of my photo captions.

As I’m photographing the spectacular rustgills, I spot a cluster of absolutely tiny golden treasures nestling nearby at the base of a sycamore: they’re so small, they’re dwarfed by a green “helicopter seed” that’s spiralled to earth from the branches above.

According to Seek, they’re sulphur tufts, some of the commonest mushrooms in these woods. I see plenty of much larger ones over the course of the day as I wander around Moorlands’ paths – but none with quite the same charm as this cluster of miniatures.

It’s a reminder that the fruiting bodies of fungi that we see are only the tip of the iceberg: hidden beneath our feet lies a vast network known as mycelium, which plays a vital role in helping trees flourish by enabling them to access nutrients and water and improving the quality of the soil. 

A minute’s walk from the miniscule sulphur tufts, I come across the largest fungus I see all day. It’s about 25cm at its widest point – maybe eight times the size of the sycamore leaf in the same photo. It’s tan-coloured and criss-crossed with lines that look as though they’ve been carved into its surface.

This is probably a birch polypore - a common species said to have antiseptic and other medicinal uses - growing on one of the reserve’s numerous piles of fungi-friendly, rotting logs. 

“Getting rid of the dead wood” might be a motto for ruthless business efficiency, but in this kind of environment it would be a terrible idea. Decaying trees are the lifeblood of a woodland, and the fungi that grow on them - including the descriptively named artist’s bracket and turkeytail that I spot here - play a crucial part in recycling nutrients.

Moorlands - an Edwardian woodland garden and part of the ancient Forest of Galtres – has been carefully managed by Yorkshire Wildlife Trust since 1955 to give nature the best chance of thriving. Wandering around this small reserve, which is less than a sixth of the size of Askham Bog, I’m amazed at how many fungi I see. 

I must admit that photographing them can be something of a challenge. Today I’m kitted out with a mirrorless camera, a macro lens, a flexible mini tripod and a small light – with decidedly mixed results.

The good news is that you don’t necessarily need all this kit to get decent photos of fungi. Almost half of the pictures used in this blog were taken on my mobile phone. And – unlike the wildlife subjects I usually try to photograph – fungi are unlikely to fly, run or swim off into the distance while you’re trying to line up your shot.

But you do have to be prepared to get down low and root around among the leaf litter. This is where I find a common earthball – a mottled bronze fungus that packs an unexpected punch. 

This unassuming fungus, described by the Woodland Trust as looking like a warty potato, releases a cloud of dark grey spores if you step on it – helping it to spread further afield. I was startled by a mini-explosion when I accidentally trod on a similar species – a pear-shaped puffball – in my local woods this week. 

I’m sitting on one of Moorlands’ many benches when my eyes light on a solitary, fairly large mushroom on the ground just in front of me. Its cap is a mixture of pale pink and black, and – like the more famous fly agaric – it looks like a suitable place for a pixie to sit. 

My Seek app is confident, identifying it immediately as a charcoal burner – so called because the colours on its cap resemble a charcoal flame. It’s also a delicacy, famed for its mild, nutty taste when cooked - but it won’t be going in my frying pan. I’m happy to leave it here to be discovered by more visitors to this enthralling woodland, and to support a staggering array of different wildlife. 

*Don’t miss Yorkshire Wildlife Trust’s Fungi Fest at Potteric Carr Nature Reserve, Doncaster, on Saturday 10^th and Sunday 11^th October 2026.