THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB
DEPARTMENT OF LIFE SCIENCES
UNIVERSITY OF EAST LONDON
ROMFORD ROAD, STRATFORD,
LONDON, E15 4LZ
NEWSLETTER NO. 18 August 1996
EDITOR'S NOTE
Apologies for the late arrival of the Newsletter but I have been waiting for enough
material to go into the issue. I would make a special plea to members to make efforts to
contribute items for the Newsletter. There must be many observations and news of
interest to other members and it does not matter if items are long or short. Although
articles on disk are helpful, this is not important. Please send in your articles!
Congratulations to Simon Patient who is aged 17. He has won the British Birds Richard
Richardson Award (Bird Illustrator of the Year, 21 and under) for 1996 and in July he
went to the Mall Galleries in London to collect his prize. Simon tells me that he counted
31 Painted Lady butterflies on the white buddleia in his garden and 28 on the small nature
area near his house in Maldon.
SCARLET ELF-CUP REFOUND IN ESSEX
In early March an unknown rambler found this fungus in a wood near Sunnymead Farm,
Arlesford (known by some as Cockaynes Wood). He took it to an evening class group
also attended by Ann Guiver, who in turn showed it to Ian Rose. Ian Rose visited the
wood on 19th March 1996 as did Martin Gregory and Tony Boniface on the following
day. After a preliminary identification by Ann and Ian the cup fungus was confirmed by
Brian Spooner as Sarcoscypha austriaca (Beck: Sacc). Martin and Tony also examined
it microscopically with the help of the key in "The Mycologist", Vol. 9, Part I, February
1995, and observed the truncate blunt-ended spores and the strongly sinuous coiled hairs
on the outside of the cup, which distinguish this species from the other one found in
Britain called S. coccinea (Jacq.: Fr.) Lambotte.
The original Epping Forest record was for S. coccinea, which at that time included the
five present day species. The two British ones look very similar with an inner scarlet
fertile layer and a whitish outer surface. The wood contained many fruiting bodies
amongst willows, alders and hazels on both sides of a footpath along a stream. The cups
were growing on moss covered wood or apparently on soil. It was a pleasant experience
to observe this large and conspicuous cup fungus in a county where it has been very
rarely found before.
Tony Boniface