Red and White Mushroom in the grass

An Amanita muscaria, commonly known as the fly agaric or fly amanita [*] in the grounds of Blarney Castle yesterday. It’s a poisonous mushroom found throughout temperate and boreal regions of the Northern Hemisphere, according to Wikipedia.

It’s also poisonous, but these days death from ingestion is rare. It has psychoactive uses too, and it’s eaten in various places.

Thanks Catherine for letting me know where these mushrooms were. She posted a nice photo of a mushroom from there recently! The nice thing about these mushrooms is that they are quite large, so you don’t really need a macro lens to get a photo like this of them.


Apertureƒ/6.3
CameraILCE-7M3
Focal length194mm
ISO500
Shutter speed1/200s

An evening above Dunquin Pier

Dunquin Pier at the end of the Dingle Peninsula sits below a steep grassy cliff. Last year I saw three teenage girls sitting on the edge of the cliff you can see in this photo. I got dizzy just looking at them but they weren’t in (much) danger. There’s a step below where many feet have worn away the grass.


Apertureƒ/8
CameraILCE-7M3
Focal length24mm
ISO100
Shutter speed1/30s

Hank and Ray in Charlies Bar

Hank Wedel and Ray Barron in Charlies Bar last night. There wasn’t a huge crowd but the music was oh so good. So good to hear Hank and Ray play again as we haven’t been in Charlies since before the pandemic started.


Apertureƒ/3.5
CameraILCE-7M3
Focal length24mm
ISO12800
Shutter speed1/30s