Most people associate Spring and Summer plants with fairies, but there are lots at this time of year with strong fairy associations.

 

Heather is strongly associated with Fairy Portals or entrances to the fairy Kingdom, so indicates a good place to start looking for fairies. Romany gipsies used to sell white heather door-to-door to bring good luck to a household.

 

Autumn provides a rich larder for animals, people and fairies alike!  Keep a look out in nut trees for the Caryatids (nut fairies).  After the first frost, when sloes are ready for picking, take care not to have your fingers pricked by the blackthorn-tree guardians the Lunantisidhe.  Hawthorn (also known as Faerie Thorn) bears Faerie pears.  In Celtic countries it was once considered extremely ill-advised to eat blackberries because they were the plants of the fairies.

 

At any time of year you may be lucky enough to see flower spirits or Devas, or the spirit of a tree or bush - a Dryad.

 

As the sun gets lower in the sky, the shafts of light in woods and forests make it more easy to see the Wiskies!  Not the drink, but small black fairies with silver wings and cat like eyes. And if the wind gets up - keep an eye open for Sylphs, the elementals of air who love to drift on Autumn breezes.

 

And then there are the toadstools and mushrooms. This is the time of year when all manner of lumpy,bumpy toadstools spring forth.  From childhhod, we all associate the red ones with white spots with the Fey (Fly agaric is extremely poisonous, so do not touch it).  Are they houses?  Maybe special stools?  Fairy umbrellas? We can only imagine!  You may be lucky enough to come across a toadstool faerie ring, where the Fey dance in the moonlight. Some of the toadtools you will see have proper fey names - pixie hood, elf's stool, fairy club and Dryad's saddle.

 

Please let me know about your autumnal faerie encounters.

 

 

A Dryad's saddle (this was nearly 3 ft across!)