A cherubic face struggles to emerge from a behind a mask of lichens. We never had lichens in our garden in the 1950s and sixties, now they grow in grey and orange crusts on stones, trees and garden furniture. A lichen is a composite organism that grows from algae or cyanobacteria living symbiotically among filaments of fungi. Burning coal in domestic grates has almost stopped, sulphur dioxide levels in the air of towns and cities have fallen and lichens have recolonised areas from which were previously eliminated.
Photo: Gravestone, St Mary the Virgin, Whitney, September 2009