ladyflyfsh

Chanterelles

Looks like Berkeley's Polypore Bondarzewia berkeleyi

It is already miserably hot and humid here in SW Florida, so if you are going to forage, you need to do so very early in the morning or risk a total melt down. I was taken to a new spot about an hour from my house to an area my friend found chanterelles last year by accident. We went there Sunday morning and were not disappointed. I must have picked about 6 pounds of prime chanterelle buttons with not one bug to be found. Just gorgeous! Am I a happy camper or what? Apparently black trumpets grow in this spot also and the amount of huntable land is huge. It's going to be a good summer and i don't have to travel far and wide to find some edibles for a change.

In Capetown they call them pine rings also known as Lactarius deliciosus. Americans are not that fond of them but Europeans love them.

No problem at all. Steve Axford is a Facebook friend and fabulous photographer. He lives in Australia and has a Facebook group that I also belong to. We share stories about the colorful fungi down under. You will enjoy his work.

I'm with Scott...I've never found the beefsteak mushroom and would like to one day.

Wow...that's incredible. Please update later when you know what happens.

Welcome Tetawon. Merkel Man is from Salem also. Good luck!

I went to their winter foray they held in Crawfordville. It was a good group of people there. I have a post here somewhere from that foray. I don't think they are real active, but I have nothing where I am either. I'm in SW Florida.

Oh, thanks for bringing that up. I completely forgot about the link here to the facebook group. I've had to make that group secret since it was getting out of control with too many members. So, now what I have to do in order to add anyone to the group, is to have them friend me temporarily and I add them, then unfriend. My facebook page is https://www.facebook.com/ladyflyfsh Last fall I was getting between 50-100 people asking to join almost daily and it got out of control. I like keeping the group smaller as the quality of the members is so much better. So, now the only way you can be added is to be added by someone who is already a member and you have to be their friend when they add you. Sorry if this sounds complicated. The problem is, once you change the group settings to closed or secret, you can never reverse that. Send me a message telling me your facebook name and I will add you. ~ Mary Smiley - your Admin

They are beauties!

Look at these red ones. The redwoods were loaded with all kinds of waxy caps. I wish I'd had more time to take photos there. I saw some brilliant yellow ones when chanterelle picking, but that day was nuts. It was all I could do to not fall down into a ravine that day, so not a lot of picture taking even though I dragged my camera with me.

Dave, the Orange and green is probably Hygrocybe aurantiosplendens (sensu ca).

SOMA = Sonoma County Mycological Association

That was my first time finding the parrot. I also found Hygrocybe virescens (fifth row down from the top) which was a first for me as well.

Sorry about the unorganization of the bottom half...those were photos I didn't add myself to the post, but I'd already uploaded, so I left them. The oyster kits have fruited twice yielding around 3 pounds of mushrooms. I've had a few nice fruitings of Hericium too. I went with my friend Annette to Half Moon Bay one day and we bought fresh live Dungeness crabs from a fisherman right off the boat and took them home and cooked them.

Last month over the long MLK Jr. weekend, I travelled back to my old stomping grounds of the San Francisco Bay Area to attend SOMA Camp, organized by the Sonoma County Mycological Association. It is held at the CYA Camp in Occidental, CA north west of San Francisco in the redwood forests. It's a gorgeous area and luckily for us, there had been lots of beneficial rains prior to our arrival. Since I lived in the SF Bay Area for 15 plus years, I still have lots of friends there, so one of the days before camp, I went out picking with a couple friends of mine who took me on a chanterelle hike from ######, down steep ravines and skinny little deer paths on steep hills to a creek where chanterelles were at their peak and fresh and in perfect condition. Along the way we found some candy caps too (Lactarius rubidus). That night we came back, showered off all the poison oak and cooked a feast of chanterelles, and duck breasts with candy cap popcorn for dessert. Then it was time for camp. There were so many classes offered, it was ridiulously hard to decide which one to take as there were many that occured at the same time with conflicting schedules. The first two days I just took classes all day and made oyster mushroom and Hericium kits to bring home. The last day, we went on our own foray to the redwoods so I could try and find some Gliophorus psittacinus (aka parrot mushroom) I found them in the redwoods right on the property where we had camp. Here are some other mushrooms I found and photographed: This is a creme brûlée I made after I got home and dried my candy caps and then I made a candy cap souffle too!

I am having a morel photo contest on our facebook page. You get one photo per person entry. So far I have about 70 entries. If you are on the fb group, come enter your best morel photo.

It's so nice to see so many new faces here and also a big welcome to our 1,000 member, M Havens. Introduce yourselves so we know where you are from and what kinds of mushrooms you find where you are. I hope you enjoy it here.

You'll enjoy it, Dave. It is well written and gives good incite into the underground network of the mushroom trade.

The underside of a dried specimen

John, Sonoma County Mycological Association is a myco club in Sonoma County, CA (Santa Rosa). Every year they hold what they call SOMA Camp and invite guest lecturers to come. They do all kinds of fun demonstrations, like dying with mushrooms, lots of cooking, drinking and eating, forays, growing mushrooms, you name it. It is kind of a who's who of the mushroom world and the wine, food and cheeses are to die for. I've said I was going to go to this for several years now and finally decided this was the year. In one month I will hopefully be picking black trumpets and candy caps in Sonoma County! Anyone can attend if you sign up fast enough, it sells out every year. It also costs $$ but that doesn't seem to stop anyone, it is one of the most fun events of the year and a great way to kick the new year off.

Welcome, Puffball. Happy to have you hear. Feel free to ask questions and post photos since we will all have to live vicariously through you for a while yet.

Thanks everyone. It has been a slow year for mushrooms for me. Hopefully next season will be better. I am heading to CA in a month for SOMA Camp and hope to find lots of black trumpets and candy caps to bring home. CA is finally getting much needed rain and are having the best mushroom season EVER!

Thanks 4rum. Did you see the rest of the photos from the foray I posted?