shroom picking

[stuckathuntermtn]

Right, thanks. False morels are kinda obvious though. As for the rest, soaking and cooking seems to take care of it. I think whatever happened in Bozeman involved raw morels, which I at least know not to eat.
Pouring rain now, so I suppose any morels popping up will get huDge.
Ps, I thought the brain looking ones just causes a bad stomach ache? Either way, they are easy to tell apart.
Hm, I do need to go up to Seeley Lake on Friday for some quick work.

[neckdeep]

Ps, I thought the brain looking ones just causes a bad stomach ache.

Nope. People have suffered organ damage. Just breathing the cooking fumes is dangerous.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK470580/

[The Reverend Floater]

How many seasons after a burn do you guys typically find morels? I can usually count on at least two years of decent harvests but that does not seem to be the case this year.

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[neckdeep]

How many seasons after a burn do you guys typically find morels? I can usually count on at least two years of decent harvests but that does not seem to be the case this year.

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I think its dependent on how quickly the mycelium uses up the energy stored in its sclerotia. If year one provides ideal fruiting conditions, then year two won't yield much. I read one forager's opinion that the greys hang around longer than the blacks so you might want to try again later. I've picked in about 15 different burns but only 2 were nearby enough for me to try to pick after year one. Both were epic year one harvesting and I found zero morels in both tries a second time around.

Honestly, I've got about 20 local zones I pick for naturals so there's not a lot of incentive to drive to do repeat picking in an old burn. In a good season, I can usually grind for a few hours and scrounge up a pound of Brunneas. Naturals taste a little better than burn morels, except for the tridentina. Also, when I pick a burn, I usually put up a couple buckets of dried morels so, again, not a lot of incentive to chase year two.

[Phall]

NSR: non-shroom related. Are these past prime wild asparagus or pine drops? ~9k feet Uinta Mtns Utah, pine forest



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[neckdeep]

Possibly the pinesap plant. Pine drops are usually red.

[Norseman]

Imma guess Spotted Coralroot

[neckdeep]

Yeah, you're right. That's a coral root orchid. I didn't recognize because where I've been hunting they're already knee high and in bloom.

[The Reverend Floater]

I think its dependent on how quickly the mycelium uses up the energy stored in its sclerotia. If year one provides ideal fruiting conditions, then year two won't yield much. I read one forager's opinion that the greys hang around longer than the blacks so you might want to try again later. I've picked in about 15 different burns but only 2 were nearby enough for me to try to pick after year one. Both were epic year one harvesting and I found zero morels in both tries a second time around.

Honestly, I've got about 20 local zones I pick for naturals so there's not a lot of incentive to drive to do repeat picking in an old burn. In a good season, I can usually grind for a few hours and scrounge up a pound of Brunneas. Naturals taste a little better than burn morels, except for the tridentina. Also, when I pick a burn, I usually put up a couple buckets of dried morels so, again, not a lot of incentive to chase year two.

Thank you. I think this confirms what I am experiencing.

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[John_B]

Any guesses on these boletes I saw while grouse hunting in eastern Washington around a bunch of pine trees? If these are worthy of further investigation it wouldn't be hard for me to run back up to the spot.

Edit: After a quick look through my mushroom book it seems like the brown ones are likely a type of slippery jack.

[garyfromterrace]

My best day this year for shrooms on the property, and the most boletes by far (in fact total yesterday was more than I've got in 3 years total). The season has been abysmal thus far, so nice to get a few, about 2 lbs total. Easy access from my quad trail, and the first picking I've ever done on crutches (due to hamstring tear, I wasn't taking any chances hiking in the woods).

Today, I found the below fungus and have no idea what this fungus among us is.
Any takers? Biggest one was about a silver dollar in diameter. Some sort of chicken of the woods...? (could be rotten wood below)
Didn't want to pull them to look below. A fairly firm stubby base (not much smaller dia than cap)











Edit is this the start of a lobster mushroom?...

[BCMtnHound]

Doesn’t look like any emerging lobster that I’ve seen. Usually the orange colour is already well established.

Sorry to hear about your hams. Heal fast!

[garyfromterrace]

Doesn’t look like any emerging lobster that I’ve seen. Usually the orange colour is already well established.

Sorry to hear about your hams. Heal fast!

Thanks for your take, and the ham symp hound.

[neckdeep]

Edit is this the start of a lobster mushroom?...

It's in the hydnellum genus. Hydnellums are: squat, usually wider than tall; very tough in texture, sometimes bark like; have tooth gills. The presence of tooth gills allows you to distinguish it from polypores.

If it were the beginning stage of a hypomyces parasitism, you'd be able to see the true gills of a russula or lactarius.

[neckdeep]

Timely bump. Per your advice I found some promising zones on Friday. Rain and cold had destroyed them but I dropped pins on the map to check next year.

I think you can check for porcini starting tomorrow. I've seen a couple of these late and cold seasons where zilch is happening in late summer but then we get a ton of rain and a quick soil chill down. Can be good for fast growing shrooms but not so great for chanterelles. Porcini, jacks, shaggy mane, shrimp russula and yellow club can be prolific as long as the temps stay above 35. It's a fast moving event. Seems like it all shuts down if the surface freezes even for just one night.

[garyfromterrace]

It's in the hydnellum genus. Hydnellums are: squat, usually wider than tall; very tough in texture, sometimes bark like; have tooth gills. The presence of tooth gills allows you to distinguish it from polypores.

If it were the beginning stage of a hypomyces parasitism, you'd be able to see the true gills of a russula or lactarius.

Wow Neekdeep, solid man. Shit, you know your mushrooms. So, random question for you:
pun
Although, I'm only into my 4th year on our property it seems for the most part some years we get a ton of one type of edible mushroom, another year not so much. Like year one - a shit ton of lobsters and chantrelles, year 2 a bucket load of cauliflower, year 3 multiple lbs of boletes.

Is this normal mycelium behavior?



Another bowl of boletes for the fry pan.

[neckdeep]

It sure seems like every season is different. I believe that mushrooms alternate between reproduction and an energy storage phase where the mycelium rebuilds the sclerotia. A patch can get depleted if it produces a big crop, especially if it does it in consecutive seasons. If its resources are low, then even ideal conditions only brings up a limited flush.

But, your area is very, very different from mine. Our shroom season is compressed into about 100 days and our rains are unreliable. Here its common for patches to go dormant for a few years and then explode when conditions are ideal. Its fairly rare to get three consecutive years of good conditions so the shrooms have adapted accordingly. Last season I saw about 10,000 chanterelles and this year those patches produced about 25.

I'd rate 2024 as one of the worst seasons I've experienced. I picked 1.5lbs of morels and that's it. This is following two back to back seasons that were excellent. My theory is that two productive years depleted the patches and then this summer was relatively dry which prevents the mycelium from storing enough water and sugars for a reproductive phase. Thus, even though September brought around 2.5 inches of rains, virtually nothing happened. There's some robust patches of russula brevipes in the moistest lodgepole groves but that's about it. As always, huge patches and nary a sign of a lobster. Makes me wonder if lobsters even exist up here above 6000ft.

[bodywhomper]

Found a bunch of soggy/slimy/frozen ones today (missed the big flush by a few days), but one shrump was in good shape

[tonychapelle38@gmail.com]

Found a bunch of soggy/slimy/frozen ones today (missed the big flush by a few days), but one shrump was in good shape

The soggy ones are always a bit disappointing, but that one good shrump looks solid. Curious—what's your go-to method for preserving them when you catch them fresh?

[neckdeep]

Excellent season for low elevation morels (5500-7000ft). Picked 4 lbs of black naturals out of a 3 acre patch that rarely produces more than 2lbs.

[neckdeep]

[MakersTeleMark]

Damn.

[The Reverend Floater]

Not super productive but this team managed to find a handful of morels in the burn this afternoon. Pretty darned fun to see their faces light up when they find a cap or two.


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[BobMc]

Strong work.

[garyfromterrace]

Seconded.