Posting for Rob … On Sunday, May 27, 2018, 33 people and 2 or 3 dogs showed up at the Ministik School on Highway 14 for a spring mushroom foray. The weather was warm and there had been little rain in the recent week or two. From the school, we car-pooled to the Ministik Bird Sanctuary, some 10 minutes from our muster point. We found a suitable place to park our vehicles off to the side of a road bordering the eastern limits of the sanctuary. We saw some excellent verpa and morel territory, but nary a verpa and nary a morel were found by any of the 33 souls who scoured the bush that day. The 2 or 3 dogs who participated weren’t talking, so we don’t know whether they found anything of interest. One participant did find a Gyromitra species (false morel), of which he could only produce a photograph, as he feared touching it lest he poison himself. I told him that touching even the most toxic mushroom would not cause a poisoning, but he seemed quite skeptical about this advice. One family group found what looked like some young Polyporus badeus (black-footed polypores) and another member found some LBMs. Apparently another group which went off to a different portion of the foray site than the rest of us found some early oyster mushrooms. One of our members, who apparently collects bones, was delighted when we stumbled upon the upper and lower jaw bones of a moose, complete with what looked like a full set of teeth. The sight was enough to cause us all to ruminate for a time. I made a mental note for myself that, if ever I received a dinner invitation to this member’s home, I would skip any soup she might offer.
That was it for macro-fungi and osteal finds on this less than auspicious spring foray. We all no doubt benefitted nonetheless from a good dose of exercise and fresh air!