The house is filling up with all manner of mushroom-dyed yarns, rovings, fleece and silk scarves, all in preparation for the annual craft sale at the Dunbar Community Centre in Vancouver on Saturday, November 27. I still have a few dyepots to go, most notably the lobster dyepot (Hypomyces lactifluorum), which I’ve been putting off because most of the lobsters people have given me are starting to get a bit . . . shall we say . . . ripe. That doesn’t affect the colour, but it probably means I’ll be peeling off the orange layers outside.  I’ll have to take advantage of the next dry day to do so.

Our own lobster patches – those that survived the logging behind us – haven’t produced anything this year, sadly enough. I like to think the mushrooms are protesting the fact that their space is within site of the clearcut areas. I have no doubt they’ll be rested and ready to resume normal mushroom behaviour next year.