Monday...with a mystery nut

This morning I went on a walk in the woods with Emma who writes the A Quiet Style blog, and who also lives in Brighton...

We didn’t take many photos at all, although it was part and parcel to collect leaves, sticks and berries...and then we saw this tree and some of its fallen fruit...

Neither of us knew what it was, although the fruit hung in a similar way to a horse chestnut...

...but obviously wasn’t one.

I thought it may be an almond...

so I cut one open when I got home to try and find some sort of clue...

I still couldn’t work it out:

The nut case looked a bit like a walnut, but the leaves didn’t match.

I compared a walnut I’d brought home from Italy but to no avail.

The nut inside looked a little like an almond but again the leaves didn’t match.

The leaves definitely looked like nut leaves, but I searched through books and the web and just couldn’t identify it...

My neighbour popped round with some pears and also became intrigued so has taken pictures and a leaf away, so he can have a look through his giant tree book!

But if anyone out there knows what it is, please, please let me know!

We also came across some Yew.

I have held a lifelong fear of yew ever since my mother told me in about 1978, that it was deadly poisonous, then reading an article out loud from the local paper which told us about a boy who had fatally eaten the berries.

I always used to hold my breath under yew trees, in case a berry accidentally fell in...and I accidentally swallowed it!

I also picked up some tiny apples and hawthorn berries, as well as a feather for luck!