Chances are you will be standing shoulder-to-shoulder with an expert, so make sure you ask questions and bring him/her the mushrooms you find to learn more about them. These clubs will often organize and conduct forays where people will learn how to find and identify various types of mushrooms in person. You will notice that a spore print of various colors and arrangements will appear on the paper after you remove the mushroom cap.Īnother piece of advice I can give you is to join a local mushroom club since no matter how many guides you read or bring along, it fails in comparison to finding and seeing the mushroom in their natural environment along someone who knows how to hunt for mushrooms. Take the mushroom cap and put it on a sheet of paper with the spore side down (belly), pour a few drops of water on the cap, and then cover it with a glass for a few hours. Some species can be distinguished by the presence of pores, gills, or other spore structures.Īnother trick you can use to identify mushrooms is to make a spore print and post it online. When taking photos of the mushrooms, make sure you take pictures from above but also from the underneath part of the mushroom’s cap, as well as the stalk. There are also various Facebook groups dedicated to foragers, and just posting a picture on such groups of a mushroom you’re not certain about will provide you with useful information from other, more experienced foragers. The camera (which can be the one from your phone) will help you take pictures and post them on certain apps like iNaturalist or on social media, where multiple people and various experts can offer input on the mushrooms you’ve discovered. Regarding the field guides, these are useful not only to help you identify the mushrooms but also associated trees. The mesh bags will allow for the mushroom spores to be dispersed as you walk, so make sure you’re using only those types of bags for carrying the harvest. After you can identify the two varieties beyond a shadow of a doubt, you can expand your knowledge to other fungi.įor your foraging trip, you should bring along a sharp knife, a few mesh bags to store and transport the mushrooms, a good camera, and one or two field guides. If you want to become a mushroom hunter, I recommend learning just one or two edible mushroom species each year. There are other less risky alternatives when it comes to wild edibles, and you shouldn’t consume mushrooms unless you are certain you’ve identified an edible variety. I often like to joke with friends that all mushrooms are edible once, but you should never test this theory, no matter how hungry you are, if you get stranded in the wilderness. To put things in perspective, you should know that of these 10,000 species native to North America, about 100 are considered edible and safe for human consumption. Also, few people know that mushrooms are the only non-animal food with a vitamin D content.īesides being a good food source, mushrooms may also have some medicinal properties, and their anticancer, antiallergenic, antioxidant, antiviral, and antibacterial properties are being tested by various scientific communities all over the world.Īccording to the International Journal of Microbiology, there are between 5,000 and 10,000 species of mushrooms in North America alone, so foraging for edible mushrooms can become quite challenging for the novice forager. In fact, mushrooms have much more protein than most vegetables, and they hold high levels of vitamins. If you are the type of person willing to give mushroom foraging a try, you will be rewarded with a tasty, nutritional reward. Luckily, the number of cases that result in major harm or prove to be fatal is quite low, less than 40 people per year. This means that people get in contact with various types of mushrooms, intentionally or unintentionally, and due to the toxic nature of these mushrooms, they make the statistics. It turns out that in the United States, there are more than 7.000 annual cases recorded of exposure to toxic mushrooms. I often wondered why this general fear of wild mushrooms, and after doing a little bit of research, I found out why. Those that never experienced more than the store-bought mushrooms show signs of skepticism, and their attitude toward foraging suddenly changes. Oftentimes, the topic of harvesting and eating wild mushrooms is the one that captures the attention of the room. I find myself engaging in conversation in various social circles, I often bring up the topic of foraging and eating wild plants and how this survival skill is being forgotten.
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