Afternoon adventure...
Sep. 10th, 2010 09:30 pmAfter sending back 4,000 words, or thereabouts, I decided to go for a drive down a road that has been known to yield copious quantities of Shaggy Mane mushrooms.
Shaggies are tasty, but they must be picked fresh and cooked fresh, because the nature of the fruiting body is such that shortly after sprouting from the ground like a miniature Polaris missile with an attitude, the cap begins a process of self-digestion, turning from white to pink, and eventually to a black parasol that drips what looks like black ink onto the ground.
I saw quite a number of blackened shaggies during my drive, which hints that I should have done this yesterday. As it turned out, I harvested 5 shaggies, two aspen boletes, and took specimens of two other mushrooms.
One of the two other mushrooms is a deep orange color and a bit on the old side (there were a lot of mushrooms in the forest, but very few were ones I could identify). The reason I took the orange one was because it smelled very apricot-y (tinged slightly with the odor of chemical plastic, but then again, my sense of smell is not my strong suit).
The other mushroom was part of a cluster of light brown mushrooms that smell okay, and look like something I've seen in one of my handbooks (except now, naturally, I can't find it).
Perhaps I'll do some research over the weekend. As it is, I've got the orange mushroom under a bowl to get a spore print.
Cheers...
Shaggies are tasty, but they must be picked fresh and cooked fresh, because the nature of the fruiting body is such that shortly after sprouting from the ground like a miniature Polaris missile with an attitude, the cap begins a process of self-digestion, turning from white to pink, and eventually to a black parasol that drips what looks like black ink onto the ground.
I saw quite a number of blackened shaggies during my drive, which hints that I should have done this yesterday. As it turned out, I harvested 5 shaggies, two aspen boletes, and took specimens of two other mushrooms.
One of the two other mushrooms is a deep orange color and a bit on the old side (there were a lot of mushrooms in the forest, but very few were ones I could identify). The reason I took the orange one was because it smelled very apricot-y (tinged slightly with the odor of chemical plastic, but then again, my sense of smell is not my strong suit).
The other mushroom was part of a cluster of light brown mushrooms that smell okay, and look like something I've seen in one of my handbooks (except now, naturally, I can't find it).
Perhaps I'll do some research over the weekend. As it is, I've got the orange mushroom under a bowl to get a spore print.
Cheers...
no subject
Date: 2010-09-11 08:47 am (UTC)Awesome.