Fungi that can help measure the health of our grasslands

THE mushroom season is well and truly underway – or at least it should be. But my hopeful hunt for field mushrooms and ceps – the only two species I can confidently identify and therefore safely pick and eat – have proved fruitless so far.

I’m putting it down to the dry spell. Fungi tend to appear after rain, and we may have to wait for more showers before there’s enough for mushrooms on toast.

There is more to fungi foraging than searching for a meal, however. People are being urged to look out for colourful waxcap fungi – not normally edible – as part of efforts to help experts protect carbon-storing wildliferich grasslands.

Nature charity Plantlife said it received hundreds of records for rare waxcap grasslands across the country last year, and is urging volunteers to send in sightings via its WaxcApp app again this autumn. At this time of year, the pinks, oranges and reds of waxcap fungi which pop up in meadows, lawns and graveyards are a good indicator of long undisturbed grassland habitat.

These old, species-rich grasslands are not just important for the hundreds of wildflowers that grow in them, but are a key natural solution in the climate crisis alongside forests and peatlands, the charity said.

Undisturbed grasslands store a third of the world’s land-based carbon in their soils, and old, species-rich areas store significantly more than land with few species or monocultures. But the UK has lost 97% of its traditional meadow and grassland habitat, which now covers less than 1% of the country’s land area.

■ Visit Plantlife’s website – https://www.plantlife.org.uk/uk/ discover-wild-plants-nature/ habitats/grassland/waxcapsfungi/waxcapp-survey – for more information and to download the WaxcApp.