First find...

May 2nd. First edible find for 2012. Winecaps or King Stropharia, and it was a nice patch too, but I won't be eating any of these. Why? Because I found them on some wood chips while playing golf and you should never eat any mushrooms found on or around golf courses since they are notorious for using all sorts of fertilizer and pesticides. Still it was an interesting find for me because I haven't foraged winecaps before, which is odd because they're fairly common. Note the cap of the one on the upper right...The distinctive wine color is washed out to the point where it looks like any common brown mushroom. These probably fruited during a heavy rain we had 10 days ago and were starting to get old.

Morels in Feb? Not so fast...

I was pretty sure I had put this blog to bed at least until late April when morel season starts, but we're having a very warm winter this year so today I went out for a little forage.

62 yesterday and in the 50s today, I was hoping I might come across a morel which would be rare and amazing find at this time of year.

Mike brought be back to earth by pointing out that the soil was still a good 10 degrees too cold for morels. So no morel fame for me today but not a total bust. I found many newly fruiting LBMs (little brown mushrooms) and a few tough black mushrooms (Hydnellum regium I believe) that had survived long into our mild winter.

As always, it was a great excuse for a lovely walk in the woods.

The Last Mushroom

You may wonder why after all the wonderful mushrooms we've had in 2011 I'm including a photo of this sad specimen. The answer is that I found this one in my side yard last week on December 18th. I was quite surprised to see any living mushrooms this late. So if the first mushroom of the year is celebrated, the last one should be too.

Ahhh, what a year it was...I am new to this but the more experienced mushroomers out there have declared 2011 an exceptional year in the Northeastern US. Here in Ithaca we were having a pretty good summer of foraging and then we got hit with 5" of rainfall from hurricane Earl on September 8th and it got crazy after that. I can remember rushing home from work many times so I could quickly change and get out foraging in the woods behind my house. Each time it was only the lack of light that prevented me from continuing, I would have gone all night if I could. Finally, when dusk was well advanced, I would stumble home through the forest in the dark with my bag full of black trumpets and other finds.

And so my dear reader (me) that ends this seasons blog entries. I have a few mushrooming stories that I didn't get to blogging about this year - including the photos I took of the most bizarre fungus I've ever seen in my life - but I think I'll post those next year as we ramp up for morel madness in May and the start of the 2012 season.

The Smooth Chanterelle

I finally found some smooth chanterelles! So called 'smooth' because they don't have the same defined attached gills on the underside, although they're not exactly smooth either. Notice also that the smooth chanterelle has a larger thin, wavy cap. Some of the ones I found were quite large, 6-7" across.

Last week a co-worker described finding a large mushroom "12-14cm" that she thought was a chanterelle. I was skeptical until she brought in a beautiful smooth chanterelle, one of many she found. My skepticism turned to envy. But while my back woods yielded bags and bags of lovely black trumpets I hadn't had much luck with chanterelles...Until today. It wasn't a huge haul but it was enough for a few meals and it got me off the snide.

I found mine in an open grassy area by the way. They seemed to like that better then the dense woods.

When good maitakes go bad...

I knew I was pushing it but I had a lot of other mushrooms to clean and process and...well, to make a long story short, I blew it. I waited a couple days too long on some maitakes I knew about and now these lovely mushrooms are past saving and will return to the fungus from whence they came.

This years abundance has created challenges...My preserving and cooking skills are being put to the test. I have to keep reminding myself that this is a rare, wonderful, rainy, mushrooming event and that I should gather my rosebuds (or black trumpets and maitakes as the case may be) while I may.

Note that these were already bad on Sept 28th. In 2010 I found a fresh Hen of the Woods on Oct. 26th. We had a very early Maitake season this year.

A quick foraging how to...

So ya wanna hunt mushrooms eh? Great. Here's a short guide to get you started.

Where? Ok, I'm going to break this down in the simplest way possible...

Oak = Good.

Most Maple = Not good..
Conifer's only = Not good for most mushrooms.

A hardwood forest with a lot of oaks is a mushroomers delight.

When? June through October are the best months here in upstate New York. Wait for a good rain and head out. Yes yes, I know that morels are found in late April and May but my experience hunting morels is a lot of looking and not much finding.

What? Here's a list of good 'starter' mushrooms, ie. those that are easy to id and tasty: morels, chanterelles, maitake or hen of the woods, chicken of the wood, black trumpets, lions mane or bearded tooth, shaggy mane, and giant puffballs.

How? I often spend as much time looking up as I do looking down. Why? Because I'm trying to locate oaks so I look up in the trees for their distinctive leaves. Someday I'll be enough of a woodsmen to identify oak by their trunks but right now...not so much. Once I spot the oak I go to it and scan the ground around it. btw...This is an excellent way to get lost in the woods as one oak leads to another and another until pretty soon you've lost all sense of direction and have no idea where you are. I've used the compass app on my iphone more then once to find my way back.

When you do find an edible and decide to collect it don't pull it, you don't want to disturb the roots (mycelium) if you can help it. Use a knife and cut it at its base. I've been using scissors on black trumpets and a few others and it works great.

Why? Well basically I feel like mushrooming is either in your blood or not. But look at it this way: The worst thing that can happen is that you'll have a lovely walk in the woods.

Good times...

I was out in the woods after work yesterday and came home with 4 different kinds of edibles. They are from top left clockwise: maitakes (2 of them), boletes, hedgehogs (1/2 lb), and of course the venerable black trumpet mushrooms (3/4 lb). Quite a haul eh? These are great times for foraging.

I will confess that I already knew about the large maitake in the middle left, but everything else was unexpected. The hedgehogs in particular were a nice find, I've never found more then one or two of them at a time so its nice to get enough to make a meal out of.

Note the different colors of the 2 maitakes. The top one had an unusual dusty light color, but it was still nice and fresh. The larger one has a more common darker, brownish coloration.

Ahhh but with great harvests comes great responsibility. And now if you'll excuse me I have to go clean then dry some trumpets and start cleaning and vacuum packing those beautiful maitakes.