Morchella
Fungal Boogie is a new CD by Zoe Wood and Larry Evans features 13 songs about fungi, edible and otherwise, in a range of musical styles that includes blues, calypso, polka, and rockabilly. Click here to hear a sample of the CD on this mushroom.
Click here to see identified images of morels and false morels.
Look carefully at the unusually well-developed double wall found in these very old "green" morels from near Lolo Pass, Montana in late July. Dozens of these huge specimens were found.
These two giant morels were found growing under the bleachers at Plains High School several years ago. The people who found them ate them and said they were good but a bit chewy.
Here is a nice example of the natural black morel from BC, May 2005.
How perfect the camoflage of the morel.
Two images of a nice patch of rather large black morels in interior Alaska.
Gray and yellow morels in a burn.
Morels in an Alaska burn.
This is how I like to see them. A big fat gray nestled among some fairy cups and fireweed, under spruce near Tok.
A view of the aftermath of the Bitterroot fires of 2000 from atop Lost Trail Pass. This sort of a mosaic is typical of fire in a mixed age stand. Plantations of younger pines burn more quickly. The daily changes in wind direction blows the fire to and fro across the landscape, creating fingers of black and slivers of green zigzagging back and forth across the ridges and valleys.
In the cluster of morel indicators after a fire, the fruiting of other fungi is one of the best means to determine the timing of your hunt. Many Ascomycetes, the division of fungi known as cup fungi, nearly a quarter of the species in the Pacific northwest fruit only after a fire. A smaller percentage of Agaricoid fungi follow fires, but the genus Psathyrella is well represented. This is one of the smaller of four types I frequently encounter in a burn.
The creepy looking Rhizina ululates over the charred landscape and moss on its rhizomatous hyphae about three or four years after a burn. There are no morels by the time this player arrives in a place.
This morel was caught growing right next to a Mycena pura! Imagine that. Ever see that before?
These images were sent to me by a friend in Japan. They had found them in the forest, and thought they looked right, but wanted confirmation. Minutes later, via internet, they had their answer, and the mushrooms were still fresh! YUM. Notice the particular pattern of ridges and pits in these specimens.
This is some typical morel habitat. As you see, a black dog soon becomes invisible.
This is a representation of what scrappy naturals will pop up in western Montana without even a fire. these were found in full canopy forest.
I took this picture of a petroglyph in the steep canyons of the Salmon River, and walking away spotted a cluster of morels. It was like an ancient bit of advice, if you were on the same wavelength.
A false morel, Verpa conica.
