Be Careful What You Wish For

[4rum]

Morel season here just didn't happen this year. Mushrooms, in general, were VERY scarce. I was wishing things would get better. They did! The rains came, it was hot muggy, humidity really, really high. EVERYTHING popped! I've never seen so many mushrooms of so many varieties in the woods in my life ...... an' I'm OLD!

Bad part, they all came at once. With my limited knowledge I was flooded with new stuff. I could not begin to keep up. The weather was so warm and wet and the mushrooms so thick that they started molding right away. Almost everything was soon covered in white mold. It looks a lot like powdery mildew. The woods actually stink from the rotting fungi. The Chanterelles are still pretty good but I've seen hundreds, maybe thousands of boletes just rotting away. Almost all I've been able to get to before they spoiled were bitter. I have found several beautiful Frost's Boletes and one patch of bi-colors that a few were still fresh enough to harvest.

Then I got busy for the last couple of weeks doing volunteer work at Three Rivers Avian Center (google it) helping build new quarters for some of the resident raptors.

Hope everyone is having a wonderful summer season. I'm still looking forward to fall and all that it brings.

[1shotwade]

As you know this is my first year trying to expand my knowledge of fungi. It has been a blessing for me to have all this rain that has kept me from my normal work load and allowed me the time to learn a little.The rain is the only reason i have had the time to do so.The abundance of fungi this year surprised me in that i have found species i didn't even know existed.So the curse of all the rain keeping me away from all the things I would otherwise be doing has turned out to be a blessing in that it allowed me this extra time,and increased the amount of fungi at a time that is helpful for me to learn.You truly can make lemonade from lemons!

Wade

[troutddicted]

Send me the coordinates - I'll be right over. Raptors rule!

[eat-bolete]

Extremely dry summer so far, maybe I should do a little bit historical research where in the NE it usually rains plenty, maybe it's just a bad year here but everyone around seems to receive plenty rain so that's odd to me. Still haven't had a chanterelle meal.

Hopefully the fall will be bountiful!

[Adawg]

Much the same here 4rum . With abundant rain, warm temps and high humidity, the woods were carpeted with various mushrooms . Especially chants .

This all erupted in early July . That has all changed now though . It is so dry now, it sounds like you are walking on corn flakes . And the shrooms are all gone .

But hopefully the rains will return, and we have another flush .

[4rum]

With volunteer work at an avian center, I haven't had time to do much shroomin'. Maybe that's just as well. There are so many in so many varieties I'd gotten baffled anyway. No way to research them all, do spore prints, scour my field guides. I love seeing everything pop though and that's mostly what I've been doing... just looking. I can't assimilate all that's out there. I am a little disappointed in the boletes. Not in the numbers, in the varieties. Seems like they're all bitter. I've chewed just a bit from over a hundred. Only two or three were not bitter. I haven't been able to positively ID any King Boletes. There are sensibilius, bi-colors, Frost's, and many, many others. I'd read a couple years ago that rotting King's smell like over ripe shrimp. That must apply to more varieties than just King's, there are so many rotting boletes where I've been hunting that the whole woods smells like an old shrimp boat.

Not seeing parasols this year. Strange.