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Featuring Powell's book reviews: http://www.powells.com/partner/32215/reviewA
May 13, 2008
While there is still lots of useful stuff on this page for your perusal, especially photos, I am switching my blog over to the Eat More Toadstools Blog pages, powered by WordPress. It is interactive and this is not. Plus the text editor I am using with this page sometimes goes haywire, as I'm sure some of you have noticed.
So join me there for whatever the shroomy subject of the day is. And remember, it's not always about our fungal friends. Sometimes it's about plants, sometimes about mushroomy people, sometimes about whatever I want to talk about, although on the new blog you can help switch the subject.
April 22, 2008
Sam Ristich, RIP
I just read that Sam Ristich died February 11, 2008 at the age of 92 (http://www.nemfdata.org/samObit.htm). He was a delightful old gentleman when I met him around 20 years ago. Actually, my first encounter with him, as newsletter editor of the Mycological Association of Washington was somewhat frustrating. He sent me something to publish, in those days when not everyone had a computer, but his handwriting was worse than any MD's. I simply could not translate what he wrote into useable English. But eventually he provided legible copy and all was right with the world. I don't think I've ever met anyone who was as enthusiastic about fungi as Sam. Who else could get excited about a slime mold?
April 16, 2008
Eat more shad! I drove to the annual shad planking in Wakefield, VA. Shad, beer and politicians.
April 14, 2008
Meanwhile, down in New Zealand, it's fall and the Amanita muscaria are out. This one was photographed by Kerry Garn, who tells me it was under a silver birch. It's so pretty I didn't have the heart to downsize it.
 April
April 13, 2008
First morels of the season! About 25 black ones.
April 7, 2008
No good deed goes unpunished I guess. I feed the critters, they get into my seedlings and plants in pots. Something ate the nicest 5 year old ginseng root that I had in a pot the backyard today. Most of my goldenseal rootlets survived (I suspect the critters don't like the bitter taste). I'm still waiting to see if any ginseng rootlets come up. I had them well buried under hay for the winter, but as I remove the matted hay and the birds and squirrels scratch around, I don't know if they've found all the rootlets. Time will tell. No seeds have come up in my mini-greenhouse yet either.
The mid-Atlantic region has been in a cold spring weather pattern for at least a decade and March and April are the cruelest months. Inside the aphids still attack despite sprayings of homemade organic insecticides. If I keep the plants moist, which keeps aphids from hatching, then I have fungal problems. When I move those that like chilly weather outside, the critters attack them. What's a po' boy to do?
April 1, 2008
I planted seeds in my handy-dandy new mini-greenhouse today. It could be better designed, but it does provide bottom heat. I'm hoping that it works for seeds that I have been unable to germinate in the past.
The website of the State of Missouri's Department of Conservation has a decent section on mushrooms: http://mdc.mo.gov/nathis/mushrooms/mushroom/. I was looking for Missouri information because they consume a Gyromitra species there without apparent harmful effect. Visit the site and find out what they say about Gyromitra.
March 31, 2008
Goldenseal is coming up. I have one ginseng plant in a pot that is still alive. A seedling came up in the ground and the critters may have dug it up pecking or digging for food. Feeding birds may provide evidence that no good deed goes unpunished, because without the food I may not have so many birds and squirrels in my yard. My tea herbs are slowly emerging - lemon balm, bergamot, mountain mint, catnip.
March 27, 2008
Backyard ramps coming up.
March 26, 2008
A few ramps are up in my backyard. Photos coming soon. Morel season should begin in a few weeks. The wind killed one ginseng plant in a pot. One goldenseal came up in a pot.
March 6, 2008
A few ginseng seeds are up! One is now an "inside-outside" plant in a small container. Damping-off disease is my major concern at the moment. I sprayed with a weak chamomile/cinnamon solution as an organic fungicide. I hope it works!
February 21, 2008
I do not have many mushroom photos on my site. This is due to a combination of events. I did not have a digital camera until mid-summer of 2007. But there were few mushrooms to photograph after I bought the camera because of the drought that seemed to be everywhere I went. Parts of WV did get plenty of rain at critical times though. Vince Lombardi took some excellent photos and I helped identify what I could. They are available at: http://www.abramscreek.com/boulders.html. As always, do not attempt to use these photos to identify for the pot. Note that in some cases I cannot ID the particular mushroom and in other cases I can only ID at the genus level. And of course, some could be misidentified.
February 20, 2008
Only 6 more weeks to morel season, plus or minus a week or two. Will this year be better? I found a large cluster of oyster mushroom in my neighborhood the other day. They were a bit old and while I didn't see any evidence of rot on most of them, they were dried out. I almost always pass up what isn't fresh, so I didn't harvest these, but I'll monitor the stump for more.
February 15, 2008
I'm putting my seed orders together. Does anybody have any suggestions? Also, please check out my advertisers when you are ordering seeds. I updated my first plants page to include the seed or plant supplier.
September 4, 2007
Dry, dry, dry again. I found 2 baby Hericium in 2 days of mushrooming, driving into the mountains and looking locally. Too small to photograph even.
August 24, 2007
Some rain, but not really enough to produce a good mushroom harvest. Below is a photo of the one ear of corn I've been able to acquire with corn smut (Ustilago maydis). It came from an Amish farmer's garden. This fungus is quite edible and increasingly hard for me to find due to drought, smut-resistant plants and the fact that Mexican labor is used on many farms. In Mexico it is called huitlacoche (also spelled cuitlacoche), which apparently is Aztec for raven's excrement. But that doesn't stop Mexican's from eating it.
July 25-30, 2007
Despite successful workshops at the Starwood Festival in Sherman NY, there is little fungus to be had. Western NY is as dry as VA. What few sprinkles come have been soaked up early. Some Agaricus campestris was scored in a lawn in rural PA while the dogs barked and the locals likely wondered why that hippie was picking mushrooms. Drive-by mushrooming, as we called it when Jeff , Ray and I would cruise the woods and surrounding lawns for mushrooms. When they were spotted, the passengers would shout, the driver would stop, and we'd all jump out of the car and pick.
The Agaricus were cooked up and served to the folks I was camping with at the festival. These mushrooms are related to portobellas, but are much better. And portobellas ain't bad.
July 15, 2007
Mid-July and the chanterelle season is looking worse than the morel season. Very little rain. Three chanterelles and a chicken of the woods at my favorite Maryland patch. No fungus at all in Southern PA.
May 14, 2007
Another terrible morel season. It goes from too cold to too dry to too hot. Those who have benefitted from local showers have picked decent numbers, but for most of us it's been a few dozen mushrooms for the season. Must be global warming. It's also a hard year for plants for those of us without greenhouses. My 2 small ginseng beds, where I planted rootlets because my seeds failed last year, produced one plant out of 20 rootlets. Maybe there's some healthy ginseng root eating squirrels in the yard now.
March 30, 2007
It is almost morel season in Northern Virginia! Ramps are out, cherry trees and bradford pear are blooming but I have not seen redbud blossoms. I am hoping my urban ginseng patch works out this year, but no plants have yet poked through to the surface. At the moment it is dry and chilly here, with daytime temperatures in the 60s and 40s at night.
Check out http://www.morels.com/ for state morel discussion lists and see what everybody else is finding.
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