Just a little bit of the good stuff. They are just getting started this far North so hopefully we will get a good rain soon and the next flush will be a full one.
Yummy.
@18650. Where you at? Location? Just curious
Northern Michigan, just South of the Mackinaw Bridge.
How do you know those are edible and won’t kill you when you eat them?
back in the day we use to go out hunting for the Psilocybe types in our neck of the woods. damn, why do we have to grow up so fast. no time to do anything fun anymore.
[quote=AlexGT] How do you know those are edible and won't kill you when you eat them? [/quote]
you get familiar with one or few types and stick with those. old saying goes something like this..." there are 2 types of pickers. smart ones and dumb ones. dumb ones die out. although some smart ones are not around anymore either."
Morel mushrooms are easy. The false ones have a solid stem and the real ones have a hollow stem. I have been picking them for most of my life. On a really good year I find thousands and dry them. I could sell them to local restaurants and they go for good money but I like them too much to sell.
Some people just know. I had a friend who had a book of mushrooms full of detailed photos and descriptions of all kinds and stated whether it was edible, pyscodelic, poisonous… Not everyone should go out picking and eating mushrooms
A lot of us around here grew up picking mushrooms so we have our spots and know which ones are which and what time of year to pick. Morels are the hardest to find but well worth it. Then there are beefsteaks I don’t pick them. They can make you sick if they grow on the wrong soil and if they are not cooked and drained properly. So I stay away plus they are out at the same time as morels which are better anyway. Stumpers and puffballs are fall mushrooms that are also very popular they do have look alikes and you don’t pick them unless you know which are which. Although most puffballs are not dangerous, just some taste great and some are nasty. Stumpers look like a lot of other large brown mushrooms and you want to really be sure to get the right ones.
I would say that the best way to get into mushroom hunting is to find someone to take you or even take a class where they go out and show you how. Although Morels are the easiest to get right they are probably the hardest to find.
In France you can just take them to any pharmacist, who can identify them.
Anyone can identify a popular subterranean mushroom, the truffle, by smell 
With friends one day I did consume
what we all called a magic shroom
My mind with colored threads did bloom
as if woven in a cosmic loom
I soared laughing down a flume
as lightly as an eagle's plume
Some memories I may exhume
some best forgotten I presume
saving that one, jack 
oh I do remember those days 
Reminds me of those days partying at Radford!
Heh… Memories. Let’s just say the week of my 21st birthday was one to remember…
All mushrooms are edible, some only once. :bigsmile:
Ya know this year I picked some whites, and 3 days later we had snow! Only about 2mm deep but it stuck to the ground.
There was this guy that worked for the FCC emissions testing lab that we used. Never met him in person, only talked with him on the phone. He spoke excellent english without any accent, but talked slowly and perfectly pronounced each word. Turns out he was from China, and learned english from the Voice of America shortwave broadcasts.
One day he didn’t show up for work. Turns that China has this very delicious mushroom. Turns out that Texas has a very delicious mushroom that looks very much like the Chinese variety. Except ours also tends to make you, uhhh, dead. He woke up several days later in the hospital with a brand new liver (ok, a recycled liver) installed in him.
I love them things.
I had a buddy that used to eat the red ones. I told him I read about it somewhere that they are poisonous and that the toxins actually store up in your body over time. They can actually kill you. So he quit eating those.
What food can we make by using these mushrooms?