I love to forage for fungi in the forest, but only with a camera. I have a hard time identifying edible mushrooms in the grocery store – other than buttons and portobellos, I’m shitake at it. (And if you can’t tell a magic mushroom from a death cap, that’s not a trip worth taking!)
Gathering photos of fungi is perfectly safe. Besides proper attire and common-sense, all that’s required is hyper-awareness of your surroundings. Remember when we were kids, and we soaked up all of the outdoors, not just the path in front of us? A forest hike is always beneficial exercise, but the true joy of a nature walk is to notice stuff.
Keep your eyes peeled for fungi and you’ll be rewarded with an abundance of shapes, sizes and colours - sprouting up from the forest floor, peeking out from under twigs, leaf piles and mosses, growing on fallen trees and stumps, adorning the trunks of birch, beech and hemlock… the fantastic diversity that fuels life, decay and rebirth in the forest.
There’s so much to learn about the glorious Kingdom of Fungus - one of the most widely distributed organisms on Earth, contributing countless benefits to the environment, medicine, nutrition, fermentation… Bread! Wine! How can you not be a fan of the fungi?!
Polypores are fruiting fungi that grow on trunks and stumps. There aren’t many imposters or toxic cousins and they have neat old nicknames that point to their appearance or practicality – turkey tail, tinder conk, artist’s conk, razor strop…
Our parents liked to remind us that money doesn’t grow on trees, but Chaga and Reishi are polypores that can fetch a hefty sum, based on claims of their medicinal qualities. I’ll leave that to the experts, but we have harvested Chaga and brewed Chaga tea - it has a unique, woodsy hint-of-chocolate taste. You can’t mistake Chaga once you’ve seen it, a rock-hard, black probiscis found mostly on gray birches. (There’s one good example in the video - I’ll leave it at that and perhaps devote a future post to Chaga.)
The other thing you see on trees are lichens, but they’re not fungi. They’re neither plant, nor animal or mineral. They’re a complex and unique lifeform, the symbiotic partnership of a fungus and an alga, possibly of alien origin. (I might be kidding about that part).
Truly out of this world is the Mycorrhiza, another mutual symbiotic association, between a fungus and a tree. It’s like the underground dark internet of the forest – go down that rabbit hole sometime for a fascinating journey.
So many partnerships between fungi and other species in the forest, so much more than meets the eye…
The collection of fungi photos I’ve put together for this video were taken over the last ten years. I’m tempted to call it Part 1, as I continue to learn and explore for new species. People who are passionate about fungi love to educate others - I’ve already learned lots from the folks on #mushroomtwitter along with some good books, apps and articles. I can identify a few of the more common ‘shrooms, but it will stay a hobby rather than a diet for some time to come.
A final comment on the video and music. There are “stock” background music tracks for slideshows, but why use one of those when you can compose one of your own?
I can thank my mom for “encouraging” me to practise classical piano all those many years ago. As with all my recording projects, I had help from my husband Mike – he’s my favourite fun-guy!!
Click on the Golden Reishi for the video. I hope you enjoy it and that you may be inspired to learn more about fungi, or at least look a little closer at the forest floor on your next hike.