I have tons of pics. I'll have to figure out how to load them.

Thanks for the board.

I LOVE The name of this board... very cool

Well, I'm having a totally lame-o day - but I did squeeze enough time out of my very arduous schedule of staring at the wall to fix a FB album:

Foxes Find Fungi!

Hey look, Lou, I did it - three "f' words in a row - LOL!!!! (of course, I did the same thing the other day when I fell over a little table in my living room and bruised my leg..... ;-))

Mama Fox

I had a series called Fungus Amungus in Ohio. I carved 4 different mushrooms for it. I pulled and retired them when we moved to TN. Maybe, I'll recarve and plant them down here. I'll recarve them because I used Master Carve and they are well worn. I was a newbie, what can I say. lol

For the Last three times been out boxing I've found great mushrooms! I think the wet weather in the Bay Area are really making the shroomies pop! The coolest ones I've found have been Shaggy Mane and Mica Caps...And not so cool...Death caps are up every where. I'll try to get some of my pics and sketchs up!

Anyone else ID some interesting Mushrooms?

~Kappa!

I've seen (and eaten) some fascinating mushrooms this winter.

You can see photos over at my bloggy-blog:

http://howsrobb.blogspot.com/search/label/mushrooms

Lisa

Loving your blog Lisa - thanks for sharing it!

Lovely photos!

I just carved one mushroom stamp, thanks to your inspiration I think I shall do a series. :)

starrgazer

Those are great photo, I just started mushrooming. I got interested after the fungus fair in Berkeley this December.

Thanks for the board.

I've got the books but I need someone to show me the right ones to eat.

Shiloh

does anyone plant their own mushrooms? decorative or edible?

It's an interesting idea but I suspect it might be difficult because mushrooms are pretty specific about their environment.

I'm not a shroom expert thought so I very well could be wrong. :)

Shiloh

there are lots of sites that sell kits to grow your own, but I'm just curious at this point. I also had some really tiny ones pop up in one of my bonsai pots, and I would like to grow some small ones in my garden and other trees. I guess i could research teh particular enviornment for the type I want and try to recreate that.

Neat! Found this board tonight. I have a nice log/stump that I rely on for my 'shrooms. It only had grown Dryad saddles (pheasant backs) until this year. It has been so wet that there is some sort of jelly fungus growing there too. I hope that it doesnt mess up the spores for the Dryad's!

I got to try a morel for the first time this spring...NOT impressed! What is all the hoopla about?
Terrio in WI

I got a few indoor kits from Fungi Perfecti. I got Lions Mane, Enokitake, Reishi, and an outdoor one called HUG for short. I've been fairly successful with the Lion's Mane and the Reishi. It really depends on your own dedication. The outdoor one "bloomed" while it was still in the bag, so I got some spores from it and used it in a slurry, now the slurry has been poured around the yard and the kit has been seeded into our garden.

Good luck!
CLoveR

I can't find anything like this in my Audubon mushroom guide. Any ideas?

http://www.atlasquest.com/gallery/viewalbum.html?gAlbumId=2562

Just looking at the pic and the oak leaves around it I would guess a skull-shaped puffball. I guess you would have to open it to be sure of what it was. It looks overmature to me.

I also have a ? about one I found today...actually I wanted to tell about it so please forgive me hijacking your thread! I found some in a "fairy ring" and did a spore print...didnt help as it was white...but I pretty much determined that they were smooth Lepiota (Lepiota naucina) but the look alikes were deadly...did not feel like poisoning myself tonight so I dumped them...guess I will have to settle with the sulfur shelf I found this week...Terrio

Thanks! I was doing some more research and figured it might be either a skull-shaped or a purple-spored puffball. I went out and picked one and cut it in half and the top was greenish yellow, so I guess you are correct! I guess it pays to have more than one mushroom book because the photo in my Audubon one didn't help me. I actually guessed and Googled "brain mushroom" because that's what it looked like to me; that's a different mushroom but someone else had mis-ID'd their photo which lead me to search for "skull mushroom".

Hope you figure out your fairy ring.

How do you make a spore print? I've read about it in my mushroom book. It didn't say if you pick the mushroom or do it outside.

How about a step by step "making a spore print for dummies".

Shiloh

I can't find this one in my book either. I know, I need to get a new book. I have one picked out, just not purchased yet.

http://www.atlasquest.com/images/gallery/09/10/93010lg.jpg

Thanks!

That's a good one MO! It is a pheasant back or sometimes a black foot (I think) I call all of those kind Dryad saddles. (polyporus squamosus) If they feel juicy underneath then they are fresh enough to eat and are delicious fried in butter! Terrio

Thanks for the hopes about the fairy ring...I trashed the mushrooms--that 1% scared me!

What I do is pick the mushroom and take it inside. Have two pieces of cardstock next to each other, one black and one white. Lay the cap of the shroom gills down over the paper at the seam so half is on each color. I cover the whole thing with an overturned glass bowl. (keeps the cats out and the spores can fall straight down and not get blown away by a widow breeze) Usually the spores are on the paper within 2 hours or so. Then you can lift up the cap and see what color they are! Very easy to do and can really help with your ID. HTH--Terrio

Thank you. So I would need to do this before the cap opened?

Shiloh

I've read that morels are found around ash trees in the early spring. I was wondering if the shrooms show up before the trees start budding.

Shiloh

I was wondering if the shrooms show up before the trees start budding.

Sometimes - at least, in the areas where I hunt - especially the black ones, but they tend to less tied specific trees, too. I sometimes just spot them as dark silhouettes against a hillside. The gray and white ones tend to be a little bit later and you may want to check out sycamore trees, as well as the customary ash and dead elms (in my hunting areas, the dead elm ones come on a little bit later than the ash ones). Where I hunt, the leaves are often beginning to come out when the hunting gets really heavy.

Have fun hunting -- remember: they can hide, but they cannot run!!

Webfoot

Thanks Webfoot. My parents have some ash trees in a fence row at the edge of their yard (which is much bigger than just a lot). We don't have any sycamores here on the property but I do know where there are some.

Shiloh

I've seen some mention of morels in urban landscaping and my husband even found one on the grounds he works on. However, we're nervous about eating morels out of patches that have been sprayed. He harvested the morel and we have it and a spore print.

I have plans to try to recreate the environment in our yard and use the spores we have. I was hoping for any observations anyone has made in re: to urban morels. I have a number of micro-landscapes in our yard. I'm leaning towards woodchips under apple trees.

~CLoveR

Good luck. My family has tried for generations to get morels to grow. My one uncle was even a Forest Ranger in Maryland and he never had any luck either. I'd like to know if you have any success. It's about time to start looking here in TN.

I found some beautiful shiitake mushrooms at the farmer's market today. What should I do with them?? (I know, eat them haha!)