the fungus among us
This Sunday the LA Mushroom Society is holding a Wild Mushroom Fair at the LA County Arboretum. To prepare for the fair, they held several mushroom forays that were open to the public. I thought this would be a great opportunity to start learning about finding my own edible wild mushrooms so I signed up for a foray in the Santa Monica Mountains. Thanks to the increased rainfall, the mushrooms were out in abundance this year. In just 2 hours time, we collected 4 giant coolers worth of mushrooms. Several people never made it out of the picnic area. You were in danger of stepping on a mushroom with ever step you took. Later, a smaller party went to another park and gathered even more mushroom varieties.
We soon filled the tables up with different mushroom types.
We found some big chanterelles.
And some really big chanterelles. They’ll be at the fair if someone doesn’t accidentally eat them first.
Can you tell them apart from the false chanterelles that will make you sick?
I saw more mushrooms than I had ever seen in my life. Some were obvious.
Really obvious.
Some were less so.
My personal highlight was finding this little teal blue mushroom, which is apparently quite rare. The mycologists were very excited! You can see it at the fair tomorrow.
The mushroom fair is on Sunday, February 14, 2010, at the LA Arboretum, 10am-4pm. I am told that visitors will get a kit to grow their own oyster mushrooms at home. Maybe I’ll see you there.
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<3 the pictures! The teal one is amazing too
holy– that chanterelle is fungus humongous!
(I miss walking in the woods for mushrooms, I should actually take it up again now that I left the city)
How fun! What a great opportunity to go out and learn about mushrooms! Thanks for sharing this with us.
Jealous. We can never ever do this due to DEATH for Sean. Not sure if he can even handle mushrooms. Sigh.
So you are saying that a wedding gift of several pounds of chanterelles would be poor form?
Could I inquire where exactly in the Santa Monica Mountains you set out on your wondrous foray? I recently did my first 2 forays in Cleveland National Forest, but would love to find more closer by here in LA. Any tips would truly be appreciated.
And that teal mushroom is truly a wonder!
Hi Greg! The mushroom foray was at Tapia Park in Malibu Canyon. There were mushrooms literally popping out everywhere you step there, but as it is a state park, collection has to be done with a permit. Because all of the mushrooms were collected for the mushroom fair for educational purposes the foray leader was able to get a one day permit for the group. I imagine that any of the shadier areas in the Santa Monica Mountains will give you similar bounties thanks to all the rain we’ve been having. Good luck!