Foraging, edible fungi, not poisoning yrself?

Loads of interesting mushrooms sprouting out the ground around my area. Quite a few in my garden as it happens. I'd love to know more about what I can eat off the ground, but I don't fancy a fortnight of stomach cramps.

Anyone an expert? Anyone had any luck? Anyone able to recommend a good guide or phone app?

I'll try and post some pictures here in a bit.

I've kind of looked into it and decided I didn't really like the sound of multiple organ failure so never really put what I learned into practice.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2010/nov/13/nearly-died-eating-wild-mushrooms?INTCMP=SRCH

^ I think this was what really put me off

Also http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/8675690/Nicholas-Evans-I-wanted-to-die.-It-was-so-grim.html

I had a barbecue of wild mushrooms picked by a friend while camping a couple of years ago. They were delicious but I'm not sure I would again after reading those articles. Or at least not without making him read them too and asking if he really REALLY knows what he's doing.

On the other hand, I think there are a few things that are easily identified and can't really be confused with anything else.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_zXKbTJ2-AMI/S7IZp6U07JI/AAAAAAAAB1c/4DCk4WFW6w0/s1600/dog+stinkhorn+2.jpg

Dog's stinkhorn - cor, get yr chops round that

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-MGkq1nsUkfU/UEivTxIUZAI/AAAAAAAADYQ/rlspL4ClM6w/s1600/anemone_stinkhorn_flies.jpg

All the stinkhorns are beautiful to behold imo, but I think their edibility isn't too good.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3017/3035424360_944b1bc95e.jpg

one for you trypophiles

don't eat anything that looks like the devil's brain btw

http://epod.usra.edu/10_31_2011_related_linkIMG_7747acutresepod%20stink%20horn.jpg

tempting!

yeah, bright pink lovecraftian tentacle nests are probably nicht so gut.

I think this is an instance where the internet is probably not your friend, but a small expenditure on a proper field guide for what's good, what's edible and what's inedible is worthwhile.

My brother got very excited about finding wild mushrooms and as a result I became very fond of the chanterelles and chicken-of-the-woods he'd bring home, butI never learned to identify them for certain.

Yeah, you definitely need to have something with you right there on the spot, preferably with an ID key you can work through so you can really make sure you avoid the nasty ones

ceps are really easy to identify because the underside is kind of spongey rather than gills. and they're amazing.

Only dodgy mushroom thing Ive ever done was trusting someone else to pick blue meanies for a trip session. Luckily for me, they did right/well and it went ok but fuck i wouldnt do that again now.

you want this (seriously):

http://www.voont.com/files/images/rev/oddities/rain.jpg

I live in one of the world's mushroom epicenters, the Pacific NW. Japanese gangsters stake out whole sections of public forest for their matsutake hunts. Also, we have morels.

o shit wait that's NW only, maybe this:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51N63Z2J5SL._BO2,204,203,200_PIsitb-sticker-arrow-click,TopRight,35,-76_AA300_SH20_OU02_.jpg

OMG I HATE YOU FOR POSTING THOSE PICTURES SO MUCH

My dad kept threatening to do this while he was in VT this summer. I told him to go ahead but that I was pretty sure he'd die. In the end he ate the ones he knew from picking in Germany. They look like this:

http://www.passion-pilze-sammeln.com/images/DietersSteinpilzkorb.jpg

mmm fry them up in garlic butter!

i want that david arora book for the cover alone.

chanterelles are pretty good and easy to identify!

In the end he ate the ones he knew from picking in Germany. They look like this:

http://www.passion-pilze-sammeln.com/images/DietersSteinpilzkorb.jpg

― (✿◠‿◠) (ENBB), Wednesday, 17 October 2012 15:27 (26 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yah these are known in english as ceps, they're great

Oh, cool - I didn't know what they were called in English. You're right though, they're amazing. My family over there is nuts for them and I've been hunting in the woods for them before. There are tons in that area. My aunt makes a soup out of them that's out of this world delicious.

are ceps the same thing as porcini?

I like to eat wild mushrooms but sometimes they make me feel really, really big

lol it would have never occured to me that steinpiltz were the same thing as porcini but what do you know:

Common names
Common names for B. edulis vary by region. The standard Italian name porcino means "piglet" in Italian, and echoes the term suilli, literally "hog mushrooms", used by the Ancient Romans,[15] and still surviving in Southern Italian words for this mushroom.[16] The derivation has been ascribed to the resemblance of young fruit bodies to piglets, or to the fondness pigs have for eating them.[17] It is also known as "king bolete".[18] The English penny bun refers to its rounded brownish shape. The German name Steinpilz "stone mushroom" is derived from the firm flesh.[19] In Austria, it is called Herrenpilz, the "gentlemen's mushroom",[17] while in Mexico, the Spanish name is panza, meaning "belly".[20] Another Spanish name, rodellon, means "small round boulder", while the Dutch name eekhoorntjesbrood means "squirrel's bread".[21

So apparently they're also called penny buns in English? Huh. Anyway, steinpiltz/ porcini/penny buns = DELICIOUS

man, it's really insidious how the symptoms of poisoning don't show up until like 8-72 hours afterwards.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2f/Porcini_mushroom_soup_in_breadbowl_poland_2010.JPG/220px-Porcini_mushroom_soup_in_breadbowl_poland_2010.JPG

omg I want this soup:

A porcini mushroom and noodle soup served in a bread bowl at a Polish restaurant

while the Dutch name eekhoorntjesbrood means "squirrel's bread !!

does eekhoorn mean acorn?

the only mushrooms I've ever been down for picking was plain old field mushrooms. anything else gives me the willies. I remember walking through a pine plantations near school camp and seeing all kinds of crazy red and white toadstools and stuff right out of an enid blyton story. that's when I was like, wow nature is a real bitch. HAY KIDS LOOK AT ME I'M CUTE DON'T YOU WANT TO EAT ME NOM NOM NOM

does eekhoorn mean acorn?

― jiff boycott (NickB), Wednesday, October 17, 2012 11:27 AM (21 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

It must, right? That's adorable and hilarious on several levels.

Those stinkhorn pictures actually make me feel sick.

Though the maiden veil is purdy:
http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m1yhakRxx31r5vra7o1_400.jpg

the stinkhorns are terrifying...why are they bleeding like that? guhhhh

wow that maiden veil is cool

MORE CRAZY FUNGI PHOTOS PLS

time-lapse of maiden veil growing is O_O
i can't find the one i've seen but it's amazing, don't think i could eat something that otherworldly

there's a tumblr for mycology, highly recommend if you like pictures of fungi
http://mycology.tumblr.com/

omg thank you LL, I am going to play there today, wow!

MORE CRAZY FUNGI PHOTOS PLS

― set the controls for the heart of the sun (VegemiteGrrl), Wednesday, October 17, 2012 1:27 PM (7 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I honestly don't know if I can stomach looking at them again.

Bleeding tooth fungus. Go.

Oh god it's worse than I rememered. WHY IS THIS A THING THAT EXISTS IN THE WORLD?

http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lo7da5oddU1qenau4o1_500.jpg

I don't see what's gross about this?

Gaestrum triplex aka Earthstar

not gross, just kinda cool

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fb/Geastrum_triplex.jpg/800px-Geastrum_triplex.jpg

yeah I kinda like the gelatinous weirdness of them...i've never seen anything like that before!

bleeding tooth fungus looks like a frosted christmas cookie

I mean the name is gross but the fungi itself is lovely. Pretend it's called the ruby glass mushroom or something.

Earthstar is my favorite.

Wait you really don't think the bleeding one is gross? It's horrifying to me. :(

but they're . . . OOZING

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hydnellum_peckii2.jpg

the zombie hand apparently might be a kind of stinkhorn

also this octopus stinkhorn is amazing

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_zhgeHkCzX2Y/TS-CVOfKIDI/AAAAAAAAAqg/1ia3o_JWoGM/s1600/Stinkhorn113147.JPG

that looks like a chicken foot

i'd guess that there is a major crossover between horror movie enjoyment and mycology enthusiasm

otm

Fungi are amazing. The fact they are some weird limbo between a plant and an animal... and grow in such bizarre ways/shapes... and some of them can slay a man in hours.

Theres been a few incidents here of ppl dying of poisoning because death caps look v similar to some kind of chinese straw mushroom thats rly popular? So chinese ppl have been foraging for wild ones, mistaking them with death caps, and... yeah, a few deaths the last year or 2 reported in the media.

I think thats the scariest bit: death caps look so innocuous and edible!

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-06-08/woman-dies-after-eating-death-cap-mushrooms/4061254

Holy shit that hand mushroom.

NEVAR FORGET

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuKjBIBBAL8

yeah that hand reaching out of the grave is something else. must have died of mushroom poisoning

I know I will sound like a monster but I FREAKING LOVE THAT CLIP, Old Lunch

so amazing

Fantastic

http://www.kaijuzoo.com/images/m1trikes/mwbox.jpg

http://www.wildmanstevebrill.com/JPEG%27S/Mushroom%20Images/GiantPuffball%26Samantha.jpg

whoa is that a puffball?

Do not watch this video.

SERIOUSLY. DO NOT WATCH THIS VIDEO.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4dFU1MmL6c

holy cats

that's INSANE

The real tragedy is that he somehow managed to get to keep that horrible moustache

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=strange-but-true-largest-organism-is-fungus

Based on its current growth rate, the fungus is estimated to be 2,400 years old but could be as ancient as 8,650 years, which would earn it a place among the oldest living organisms as well.

also for anybody interested in the subject, check out the work of Paul Stamets:

http://www.fungi.com/about-paul-stamets.html

Pretty stinkhorn:

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_SqhhJb_P3Kk/TEnvtu1mkpI/AAAAAAAAMic/Stz93fc2Ln0/s1600/red+cage+fungus.jpg

Seriously thinking about starting a tumblr of 'horrors of nature' or some such... so many terrifying things out there.

Mollusks and fungi horrify me in roughly equal measure. Slight horrific advantage to mollusks why because there are no magical varieties.

You don't even like this little guy?

http://www.maniacworld.com/snail-has-a-stick.jpg

Eh, I can deal with snails and slugs. I'm mostly horrified by the tentacled critters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zfyRxPPVI4

Oh yeah, they're scary. Quite majestic, though. I think I'm cooler with the animals because I at least understand their existence, whereas the funghi are just kind of incomprehensible to me.

that slug is adorable

snail is only cute until you realise just how long this game of fetch is going to take.

lol

i still love him

do not eat a
amanita

http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mbnao3WEDA1qbtg56o1_500.jpg

this doesn't have anything to do with fungi specifically, or eating it, but i feel like those who appreciate grotesque fungal growth may enjoy this as well
Ken Middleham appreciation thread

http://flic.kr/p/cxsGBq

oops oh well
it was a giant puffball

http://i.imgur.com/CqOZiYA.jpg

that's the one!

awesome

http://24.media.tumblr.com/264f2e015bc682c4bcb207c3469d3acb/tumblr_mhs4ippP8Q1s52lxho1_400.png

omg donut mushroom

this one is native to australia!

http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m2wyixRxxj1r0m1eyo1_500.jpg

i think it is called a stinkhorn

we go out mushroom-hunting quite often, actually. find all sorts of things, but most of the time, we're hunting for Matsutake and King Boletes. we collect the Amanita Muscaria because we make a tincture out of it that is good for topical use to ease pain from nerve damage. (also, i've eaten slivers of it in my life, and let me tell ya— walking across the golden gate bridge tripping on Amanitas is really quite something).

The one rule of thumb I gathered from reading wilderness survival books in a misspent youth is to never, ever try anything with a cup-like structure (volva) at the base, like this deathcap:

http://www.anbg.gov.au/fungi/images-misc/deathcap-a.gif

The Destroying Angel shares this feature. Seems like a good idea to generally avoid little brown mushrooms as well, which share the same amanitin toxin.

^ Several of which share the same toxin. Amanitin containing mushrooms cause more serious poisonings than all other fungal toxins combined.

we generally are pretty careful, and only consume things we are absolutely sure of from experience and massive research. the Arora book is quite good for northern California and the PNW. also, it is totally worth getting for the pictures alone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffDPTKn7HiY

^^^the table is the table, last week

damn right

candied fungi

http://25.media.tumblr.com/c238d8c61d369e918a41d9c9f29d3605/tumblr_mgxm5gmvq71qg6he0o1_500.jpg

watery fungi

http://24.media.tumblr.com/1387b52f8a99ea4c10c213dcd5ffba7e/tumblr_mkves9gP3i1qgxr01o2_r1_500.jpg

wow

damn i forgot about this thread until i read this -- and i can't believe i am writing this in 2024 (jk i can believe) -- Amazon is flooded with AI-generated mushroom foraging books that could literally kill people.

https://www.404media.co/ai-generated-mushroom-foraging-books-amazon