There's cause for celebration in the Taylor household: the spring mushrooming season has started...finally.
Last weekend we held our first-of-the-year foray on Mt. Hood, driving an hour or so to one of our favorite locations. We arrived with great anticipation of the abundance that might be awaiting us, and we weren't disappointed, especially given the persistent rains of the earlier weeks in May.
We were greeted by a sunny and rather warm day as we stepped from our vehicle. The grasses were growing tall, the ground was moist, and the usual spring flowers (as shown in the photograph above) were in full display. Always a good sign to see companion plants. We were soon bending down and gently plucking puffballs from the soil.
We've made it our practice to religiously remove any debris clinging to puffballs before placing them in our collection basket. Of course, this prevents the beautiful exterior of the puffballs from becoming dirty and harder to clean when we're back at the cabin.
In addition, we also slit each puffball to ensure that the interior is a snowy white color with no signs of yellowing or browning. Any puffball that doesn't pass the "slit" test is quickly returned to the ground so that it can distribute its spores and create future generations.
You can sometimes tell inedible puffballs by the color of outside of the mushroom. For example, the color of two puffballs in this photograph is a dead giveaway - their exterior is tinted with yellow and brown. That's a pretty sure sign that the interior has begun to turn. You don't want anything but pure white showing inside the mushroom. And, to top it off, we've never seen ants feeding on edible puffballs.
Remember that with puffballs, it is conceivable that an inexperienced 'shroomer could mistake an Amanita for a puffball. We typically cut them in half as a final precaution. If it's solid, consistently white all the way through, it's a puffball; the Amanita would have a visible mushroom shape inside, with the cap and gills "folded" against the stem prior to expanding away from the stem to expose the gills. If you see that, it's an Amanita and is poisonous! This has never happened to us in over 30 years of gathering puffballs, perhaps because we recognize the difference between the two so clearly, but we read once that this is a good precaution, and it makes sense to us. Of course, slicing it in half also confirms that the flesh is in prime condition!
Our experience has been that Morels arrive in the places we usually look for them a couple of weeks after our first successful puffball foray. We'll soon check back in with you and let you know how that foray goes!
Until then, celebrate the beginning of our new mushroom season!