Not all museums are from the same mould
The Victoria and Albert Museum , London Image credit: Andreas Praefcke Visiting one of our national institutions like the British Museum or the V&A brings home to you the big difference between them and little outfits like Fairlynch. It’s money of course. Volunteer-run museums such as Budleigh Salterton’s operate on a relative shoestring, frequently running at a loss because of the cost of maintenance both of the building and of the environmental conditions needed to conserve artefacts. Amanita muscaria (fly agaric) Image credit: Michael Maggs Our damp English autumn is a time for fungi foragers, for mushrooms, for spectacular toadstools like this, and of course for mould. Yesterday I remembered too late that I’d left my smart new gardening gloves in the potting shed at the end of the summer. When I went to rescue them they’d changed col...