Since my wife passed away some three summers ago I haven't done anything
to the flower borders that she used to tend apart from just keeping the
grass down.

Yesterday I thought I'd better do something about cleaning up one of the
flower beds and making it look presentable. Apart from a whole tangle of
couch root, as I loosened the soil I discovered something which I'd
never seen before.

They look like mushrooms lying on their back (no stalks!) and are black.
From what would have been the dome of the mushroom, which is underneath
there are what look like very fine roots. The largest is five to six
inches in diameter and there are several smaller ones, about two to
three inches in diameter.

I don't remember what was planted there so I don't know quite where to
start looking for an explanation of what these might be. There was no
evidence of recent growth so I assume that, whatever they were, they're
dead. But what were they? Were they a bulb of some sort?

David

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David Rance writing from Caversham, Reading, UK