However, this is not any fool's gambit. A single mistake can kill you dead as mushroom soil, and your passing won't be much fun. I've been dabbling in this for nearly 20 years...I know just an even dozen w/o doubt..and I stick to them, strictly.
There are 'cautions' such as no alcohol first time, no alcohol anytime, must be cooked fully, too far 'gone'..count on using a lot of water in the porcelain bowl fer a while.
My advice...buy some books, more than few, read 'em almost religiously until you understand free gills, veils, forked gills, detached and attached gills, what the phrase 'look alikes' could mean. Read 'em cover to cover. Take no chances, find someone who KNOWS what they're doing, and would first offer you all the same advice I am.
Some of the world's most complex chemical compounds are found in fungi (mushrooms). That includes some of the planets deadliest toxins..which ironically enough all end in "ins". PA has over 4,000 species of fungi, as many as any other local on planet earth. They are all beautiful in their own right...just so happens that many of them are also deadly.
You'll learn abbreviations such 'LBMs", Little brown mushrooms. With the exception of one...I avoid them like the plague. Too many absolutely deadly 'look alikes'. Same with white mushrooms, save a scant few. Those few..have no similarities whatsoever to host of others will shut your kidneys down permanently.
don't write it all off as possible, ain't no such thing. Get schmart first, don't get dead. Learn and go real slow. That way we all get to celebrate your fungal adventures for a long time to come. :)
ed
I know a some edible ones with certainty because they are so unique and easily identified... usually. At LEAST early on, shrooming is more about study than anything. Years later, I still study them in earnest.... and eat very, VERY few. To say that I'm overly cautious is an understatement.
When folks find out I regularly eat wild mushrooms, someone invariably wants to do it too and starts asking questions about how to I.d. them, takes pictures for me to look at, or brings them to me for inspection. I'm still learning myself, certainly no expert on them, and knowing the risks, very hesitant to give advice. If I'd eat it, I'll tell them so... but I don't know if they understand how unbelievably cautious I am with them.
When you DO eat one for the first time. Eat a small amount, tell someone 'near' to you what yer doing, and leave a sample handy in case someone else needs to discern what you've injested.
It's fun to seek and find them, fulfilling to know you're utilizing what nature provides, the right ones are very tasty and very healthy... but eat the wrong one, and it can kill you in less than an hour... so use yer head. Take it serious or let them be.
Kirkus's Link
Kirkus's Link
Kirkus's Link
Kidding aside, think it would be great to go with a guide to learn to identify edibles of all kinds. They offer them in a lot of the state parks nationwide.
I'm also hoping...a few of the goodwits hereon this here website..take the clue...you and I get along jes fine:) I know some are already thinking...and that ain't bad :)
Real good to see you here, Real GOOD:)
e
most of the shrooms around here, seems like folks want to make some kind of "tea" out of ????
