Fungi from the woodpile

[[1ponders]]

Well its pretty overcast and we're in for some rain so it must be getting to fungi weather. These have been around for a while now, but its nice to make a start. I haven't bothered to try to identify them yet. I'll leave that till I get back to work.

The first 2 are growing on old Blackwood Acacia logs, the third is growing up from the ground but I believe again it is growing on old Blackwood roots. The 4th is growing from Bunya nut logs.

[multiweb]

Are the orange ones edible? I used to go and pick a lot of mushrooms in autumn back home with my grand father as a kid. When all the leaves fall and start decomposing they grow like crazy. He knew which ones you could eat or not. Most can make you sick badly and some are deadly but the good ones are yummy.

[[1ponders]]

Unfortunately none of those are edible that I know of Marc. I don't mind munching on a some nice field mushrooms as well, but I won't take the risk if I'm the slightest bit unsure

[Dennis]

Quite a collection there Paul, I hope that they don’t congregate in your observatory!:eyepop:

@Marc – in the UK we had a mushroom called Fly Agaric which had a very colourful red cap with white spots which I think was hallucinogenic, if not toxic. I once saw a program from France on collecting Truffles which were incredibly expensive and difficult to find.

Cheers

Dennis

[DavidTrap]

A few years ago when I was working in ICU, there was one fatality from eating field mushrooms. The spouse was elsewhere in the hospital with a milder case of "badness". I can't remember the mechanism by which it killed this guy - I think it did something to his heart.

Amazing that something which looks so innocent could prove fatal.

Nice pics BTW Paul.

DT

[xstream]

Interesting point that Dennis has brought up. Fly Agaric or Beni Tengutaki is classified as a deliriant; psychedelic.

A few years ago now in our travels Anna and decided to pick Chestnuts for a couple of weeks, during that time Fly Agaric fungi were popping up everywhere under the Chestnut trees it was quite a pretty sight.
We had a young French back packing couple picking along side of us and they just couldn't pick enough of these fungi with the Chestnuts. ;)

[renormalised]

Nice shots, Paul:)

You know, when you come to think of it, just how many people in the past "sacrificed" themselves in order for the rest of us to come to know what mushies were safe and which ones were dangerous. Must've been quite a few.

[[1ponders]]

The problem was though Carl, too many of them kept forgeting which ones they were testing and kept going back to check .... just to be sure :rolleyes: Crazy. A very quick way to burn out the brain. It can only take one.


These are all wood fungi though and quite tough and I doubt very much if you could get much of a meal out of them, even if they are edible.

[renormalised]

That much is obvious:):) All that psilocybin scrambling their brains:):P

You most likely wouldn't, as you said. Even edible ones can be rather bland and tough. Much like eating wet newspaper:)

[[1ponders]]

For sure, some are, and some I still wonder how people can eat them, but some are damn yummy. 't's funny, I don't generally like fermented foods particularly wines, cheeses yoghurts, beer etc, particularly the ones that have a yeasty aftertaste, but damn I like a good mushy dish. :D

[multiweb]

Yeah anything that is very colorful or has flesh that turns blue/green when you slice it open and expose it to the open air is bad news.

Back home the oldies have stories of entire families of farmers wiped out over night because they had a big meal and all hate the same thing for dinner. Sometime differences between bad and good are unfortunately very subtle and that's when you get caught.

You know they use pigs to find the truffles. They have better olfactic sense than dogs and will find them under 300mm of dirt. They love the stuff. Ironically we also cook pork with truffle. Like sucks for them. :lol:

[stephenb]

Nice images, Paul, thanks for posting them.

I often see people on the sides of country roads picking mushrooms. I always wonder how "expert" they are with identifying the correct ones.