By this time of the season, bobert, I always have some yellowing of lower leaves - less so this year than in years past, but I have also been able to keep the few tomatoes I have, planted in 1' high raised beds, very evenly moist while also well drained.

Speaking of them 'maters, I went ahead and picked the two mortgagelifters that are showing good color. They are not entirely ripe yet, but I was afeared a mocking bird or sumpin' would come peckin' at 'em iff'n I left them on the vine any longer.

Now that I have pulled the zucchini, the "Straight 8" cuke is finally starting to grow some cukes. It was also developing some powdery mildew that I haven't had time to do anything about, but the improved air circulation seems to have helped a good bit.

That bright yellow fungus is weird. It mostly arises in a spreading fashion on the soil surface, then turns a buff color. Where it grew up under one of the basil plants, it puffed up a bit around the stems, but doesn't seem to have harmed the plants any. It changes really quickly.

The mycelium have been visible on the soil surface for several weeks, sometimes more visible than others, and there is definitely a relationship between rain and/or watering and fruiting. I don't think it is anything to worry about. Just interesting.

As I have said before, under all these trees I have noticed all kinds of interesting fungi and mushrooms over the nearly 2 years since I actually moved in. (Unfortunately, while most are benign, some are dangerous to the trees, and some can be damaging to the trees is the trees get stressed (like- by the 3 year severe drought of the recent past.) He says the borers that killed the big white oak are opportunistic, and probably would not have caused much harm to the tree unless the fungus had already done significant damage. He noted 2 different fungi of concern (which I will have him write down when he shows up, hopefully this week, to take down the dead tree) on assorted trees.

One of the two is generally not so serious, and not so hard to treat and control, but if trees are stressed or old and it really takes hold, can make them vulnerable to borer damage and death. Sorry I can not remember the name, but it causes the tree to ooze sap where it gets in between the bark and the cambium layer. Has a sweetish, fermented odor. That is the fungus that drew the hordes of hornets year before last to a small patch on an otherwise healthy tree.    He says it is common, and not of concern to healthy, reasonably unstressed trees.   I have one other large oak that straddles the rear property line with some more extensive damage from that fungus, but he suggested some controls, including treating with a hydrogen peroxide solution and cutting back the plethora of privet and forsythia sprouts that crowd it's base, sapping nutrients, water, and causing poor air circulation. 99% of the brush is on my neighbor's property, but I expect she will give the ok for me to cut it back. He thinks the tree can be saved if vulnerability is reduced now, in spite of some evidence of borers.    This tree is older and bigger.

The other fungus is more serious. The few places he saw evidence of it are currently inactive, but he told me to keep a very close eye on them, and to treat them immediately if it became active. (he recommends organic treatments as first choice.)

He also led me to some new research. He suggested chipping the smaller wood from the tree he will be taking down, and using it to mulch around the trees. Says it is ecologically good practice to allow the debris to remain when it was produced. The last time I researched using chipped wood as mulch it was a strong no-no, but that was a long time ago.    More recent and (what looks to me) good research, makes a strong argument in favor of going ahead and using the woodchips for mulch around the trees.

Dang, learn something new every day!