A late-summer visit to Winant Park in Concord brought me the sight of tall summer wildflowers blooming cheerfully by the parking lot. Once I passed the information kiosk where the trails begin, there wasn’t a blossom in sight. Instead, mushrooms were all over the place. I don’t know what’s what when it comes to fungi, so I was reduced to simple wonder at the variety of colors and sizes. A hazy day made the usual Winant vista unremarkable, but the colorful forest floor made up for that.

With my shoe (at left) for scale, this was a ground-hugging mushroom that blended in very well with the forest floor.

This one reminded me of a kind of coral.

Not a pair of rocks, but a mushroom tucked against a stepping-stone size rock.