Father Pitt believes this is some species of Sarcoscypha, but further than that he is unwilling to go (and apparently even mycologists have trouble unless you give them a microscope), and he may be wrong about the genus anyway. But it’s a remarkably bright red. It was growing on a stick in the leaf litter near the Trillium Trail in Fox Chapel.
Fiddleheads of Christmas Fern (Polystichum acrostichoides) unrolling along the Trillium Trail, Fox Chapel.
Some scenes along the Trillium Trail in Fox Chapel, just before the big spring show begins.
It is a narrow trail along a precipitous wooded hillside, but Fox Chapel is still the kind of neighborhood where you have to specify “NO GOLF.” This is the south entrance to the Trillium Trail, which can be found on Hemlock Hollow Road, which used to bear the slightly embarrassing name of Squaw Run Road.
Virginia bluebells line a trail in Fox Chapel.
Bluebells are not necessarily always blue, as you can learn at our sister site Flora Pittsburghensis.
Bracket fungus growing on a fallen tree near the Trillium Trail, Fox Chapel.
…as someone remembered while walking the Trillium Trail in Fox Chapel. But it seems that someone forgot that it might still be useful in the rest of the world.
It requires very little imagination to see why young fern leaves are called “fiddleheads.” This one was unrolling in late April along the Trillium Trail in Fox Chapel.
