A walk in Sherwood Forest

Yesterday Meg,Vicky (my lovely neice) and I went for a walk around Sherwood Forest. We started off at a village called Budby, crossing some lovely heathland with lots of heather to get to the ancient woodland.

Here is a picture of Vicky taking photos. As you can see there are some very ancient trees in the forest. Some are hollow and dead, but are amazing habitats for so many species, including these creatures...

Yep, this is a hornet's nest. I am quite surprised at how well I coped, seeing as I am a bit scared of bees and wasps after a mishap at Bee club aged 13 whilst at school (Imagine the health and safety around a school keeping bees now?!) The hornets tolerated us for a while, but began to be a bit more than curious, so we left! I was quite fascinated to see the social behaviour of these insects. The one at the top of the last picture was the Doorman/ Bouncer and seemed to vet every other hornet arriving back at the nest. Not the clearest of shots, but I wasn't going any closer!!!
We also saw a couple of different fungi specimen...

I liked the short, dumpy nature of this one!and the one below is it's tall thin friend! Thanks for looking - hope you weren't put off by the hornets!