Be cautious when foraging for wild mushrooms

By V. Paul Reynolds

The problem with wild mushrooms is that there are so darn many of them, more than a million species of fungi in the world. Maine doesn’t have a million species, but enough to make mushroom identification and safe consumption very tricky. The bad ones can make you very sick.

Years ago, as an avid forager of wild things, furry or fungi, I took some mushroom identification lessons from my friend, Millinocket guide Wiggie Robinson. Diane and I only cooked the wild mushrooms that were given the good housekeeping seal of approval by Wiggie. We never had a bad gustatory experience, at least not from Wiggie’s recommendations. Recently I learned from Wiggie’s son Jay, who knows his mushrooms, that his late father once made a bad selection and got very sick on some toxic “shrooms.” Maybe Diane and I were just lucky.

Mushrooms that grow on old hardwoods trees, such as oyster mushrooms or chicken of the woods, are always a sure bet, according to the book and Wiggie. Once, while dragging out a harvested small buck from a bog near Wayne, I happened by a hardwood tree festooned with fresh oyster mushrooms. They got dragged out, too, along with the deer. When those mushrooms were later pan fried with a piece of venison back strap it was, especially for the forager in me, the best of both worlds.

Last week, my visiting grandson’s girlfriend, Miya, from a coastal village in China, picked some mushrooms while picking blueberries near our place on the lake. Although eager to cook them up, I suggested she wait until I send a photo to Jay Robinson for his blessing. His text came back: “Paul, do NOT EAT! That is a Destroying Angel or Death Cap (Amanita virosa) and can make you very, very sick!” My mushroom book reports that this particular mushroom is “one of the prettiest and most deadly.”

The next day while walking in the woods, I found and picked some small fresh fungi that I thought to be safe Honey Mushrooms (Armillaria mellea). Miya was eager to cook, so I rushed a text photo to Jay. “Those are young Chanterelles (Cantharellus cibarius). Delicious! Cook’em up with a steak.” Those mushrooms wound up, not on a steak, but in Miya’s homemade chicken soup. She said they were wonderful and nobody suffered any ill effects.

Because of the perils of mistaken identity with wild mushrooms there is natural inclination toward timidity, to simply avoid them altogether. That’s your call, but before you do, though, check this out. The last chapter in my mushroom book is the best: Edible Fungi. It advises: “This list of edible fungi are easy to identify, there is little chance of confusing these with a poisonous species and they have been eaten by many people for many years with no ill effects.”

This edible list comprises 24 different edible mushroom species. The book is “Mushrooms of Northeast North America” by George Barron. The color photos are excellent. Once you have seen the safe edible list, you can make your own choices of how risk averse you are in the wild mushroom department. I am sticking with Oyster Mushrooms, Chicken of the Woods, Chanterelles, and perhaps a Honey Mushroom. Mushroom teacher Jay says that the Black Trumpets, which are a Chanterelle, are especially flavorful.

Oh, one other thing, even the safe edibles are not to be over indulged, at least that has been my experience. Once, after eating more than my fair share of pan fried Chanterelles, I wished that I had exercised some restraint at the dinner table.

Late summer and early autumn are a good time to poke around the woods for wild edibles. The young Chanterelles were popping up in mid August near my place at Branch Lake in Ellsworth.

The author is editor of the Northwoods Sporting Journal. He is also a Maine Guide and host of a weekly radio program “Maine Outdoors” heard Sundays at 7 p.m. on The Voice of Maine News-Talk Network. He has authored three books. Online purchase information is available at www.sportingjournal.com.