Mushrooms' popularity is booming, but so are poisonings, experts warn

Scroggy

Scout
Jul 5, 2022
86
123
Delaware
Huh. Apparently young specimens of destroying angels do look like puffballs, but you see the shape of the stalk and cap when you slice them open. I had no idea.

Apropos of the Pines, while knocking about with more mycologically-inclined friends this summer, they pointed out the fine appearance of the bitter boletes, caps unmarred by slugs or anyone else. Then we found a pile of them dumped by the road at Batona Campground...evidently some forager wasn't aware of their properties until after collection.
 
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RednekF350

Piney
Feb 20, 2004
5,064
3,341
Pestletown, N.J.
I would never trust an app in a phone to identify something that could potentially kill me.

I only had one mistaken mushroom experience when I harvested what I thought was a Hen of the Woods from the base of an oak in my yard. I was 100% certain that it was the correct species based on every indicator I had researched. Unfortunately, I didn't see any seasonal window for picking information in my research. I harvested and ate the mushroom in mid to late August and I was disappointed in the bland, unexciting flavor.

After telling an old Italian buddy of mine who really knows his mushrooms what I did, he asked, "What are you, stupid ?" I knew that was not a rhetorical question coming from this guy, so I said, "Yeah, I guess." He went on to tell me that don't pick anything that you might think is Hen of the Woods until late September and into October.

He later gave me a 3 lb. monster that he pulled out of a stump while he was stopped at a redlight and it was the most delicious thing ever. It froze well also so I had mushroom sides into the winter that year.

My saving grace was that Hen of the Woods has no poisonous lookalikes. I still don't know what I ate the first time but it didn't kill me, so I will call that a win.
From that day forward, I buy my mushrooms at the store. Picked out of beds of dehydrated horse shit out of commercial mushroom farms, they have to be good. Right ? :)
 
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