No, not another April Fool but a genuine report we received yesterday. A man out walking in woodland near his home in the county of Rutland spotted a truffle up a tree! It was wedged between the stump of a cut branch and some twigs.
The arrangement of the “cut” face and space on the branch with closer inspection reveals how it got there. A squirrel will have dug it up, carried it into the tree and found a suitable place to wedge it so they could nibble away. The next photo shows how much has been nibbled and the size of the truffle.
You can see how unripe it is at this time of year from the white gleba (flesh). About half of Rutland is on limestone so there will probably more truffles there, but probably not to be found up trees!
My friend, the forager and author John Wright, told me a different squirrel and truffle story. He was leading a fungus foray. The group were gathered in a circle while he described the identifying features of a particular mushroom. Suddenly something fell from the sky into the circle – a piece of truffle, apparently dropped by a squirrel in an overhanging tree!