What Is a Mushroom?

I love mushrooms for many reasons. Obviously some are tasty to eat. But they are also marvelous to look at, and they come in many different colors. When I pick them out of the moss or dried leaves and needles, I am amazed by how clean and perfectly shaped they are, a true art of nature. They are wonderful to hold. Some are heavy and velvety, like a ripening peach. Others are light, brittle, and shiny like a piece of jewelry. When I turn a mushroom over, I feel the spongy underside or admire the gills, which radiate from the leg like rays from the sun. But whatever the color or shape, mushrooms are all cool and of the earth.

Mushrooms seem like plants, but they don't have chlorophyll, the pigment that makes plants green and helps them produce their own food. Like animals, mushrooms "eat" their food. But they don't have feelings or stomachs, and they don't move around as animals do.

Mushrooms are fungi. Fungi don't reproduce from seeds, like plants, or from eggs, like animals. They reproduce from spores. Most spores are single, simple cells. Every mushroom produces hundreds or even millions of spores, which are carried to different places by the wind and rain, by animals and insects. New fungi grow from the spores. Some spores live for hundreds of years and are so hardy they can survive droughts and freezing cold.

If the conditions are right, a mycelium grows out of the spore. The mycelium is the body of the fungus. It resembles a mass of threads. A mycelium grows underground or beneath tree bark. It takes in food and expels waste. It can be huge, as big as a whole state! Some mycelia live for just a few days and some live for several hundred years. Every now and then, after a rainstorm, they produce new baby (or button) mushrooms.

Mushrooms are the "fruit" of fungi. Their lives can be as short as a couple of hours or as long as many years. Just as a tomato is only part of a much bigger plant, mushrooms are only part of the fungus.

Mushroom Names

Mushrooms often have funny names. When I hunt, I say, "I've got you now, slippery jack!" Or "You are not a prince, you are an old worm-eaten good-for-nothing!" I like to get the whole royal family in my basket, with the king, the queen, the prince, and the commander, but it's also nice to capture a gypsy mushroom or grab a pig's ear, or sneak up on a dead man's finger.

Every country has its own folk names for common mushrooms. There is a mushroom that some Americans call hen-of-the -woods because it looks like a hen roosting under a tree. But in other parts of America it is called sheep's head and, most strangely, cow's mouth. To the Japanese, the same mushroom looks like a dancer's kimono sleeves waving in the air, and there it is called mai-take — dancing mushroom. But in every country this mushroom is also known by its scientific name, Grifola frondosa, which in Latin means "leafy."

Scientific names, which are always Latin or Greek, are the same throughout the world and often offer interesting information about the mushroom. For instance, one little mushroom with a smooth reddish cap is called Dermocybe californica. Dermo means skin, and cybe means head. So it is a skinhead from California! Sometimes a mushroom's scientific name pays tribute to a person, like Boletus barrowsii, which honors Chuck Barrows, who pioneered the study of mushrooms in the southwestern United States. Or the scientific name may tell you where the mushroom was discovered, such as Suillus sibiricus, which was first found in Siberia. Guidebooks usually refer to mushrooms by their scientific names.

The Mushroom Feast

Mushrooms are not only delicious, they are nutritious, too. When I come upon a mushroom that looks as if it's been nibbled, it probably has been — by porcupines or hedgehogs. Sometimes I come across many mushroom legs sticking up from the ground like startled soldiers who have lost their heads. The delicious caps have been eaten by greedy squirrels and chipmunks. They got my mushrooms before I did, and it makes me mad!

I'm not fond of slugs, either. Slugs thrive on mushrooms, and sometimes I pick a mushroom and find ten of those slimy creatures on it. But after I've tossed the slugs away, what's left of the mushroom is mine.

The creature I hate most is a tiny worm with a white body and a black head. It is disgusting and treacherous. All day long I hunt, hunt, hunt. Finally I find a beautiful mushroom that looks perfectly healthy and delicious, but later at home when I eagerly cut it open, I discover the worms are already there, eating my dinner.

Truffles are the most expensive mushrooms of all because they are hard to find and have a divine flavor. The French call the BLACK TRUFFLE (Tuber melanosporum) the black diamond, and one pound of them costs as much as a good computer. In America truffles grow in Texas, California, and Oregon.

Truffles grow underground, where humans cannot find them. But certain animals are trained to sniff them out, and when they start digging excitedly, then you know that truffles have been found.

Goats lead Italians to truffles and bear cubs find them in Russia.

In France pigs are used, but they must be muzzled or they will quickly gobble up all the truffles they find. Another problem with the pigs is they are so lazy, the farmers must carry them all the way to the forest and back. Because the farmers are lazy too, they now prefer to use dogs, who love to run in the woods sniffing out truffles but don't like to eat them.

More Mushroom Lovers

Once after a mushroom hunt on an island off the coast of Maine, I sat on the beach to sort my catch. I had found some beautiful aspen boletes, which have round, robust red caps, and these I put at the far end of my towel. Before long a seagull darted down and stole one away. I laughed and thought, "He's mistaken the mushroom for a crab!" Soon he was back for another, and I realized he wasn't mistaking anything — he really liked the mushrooms. But when he came back for a third, I shooed him away and said, "That's all you get for now!"

All over the world mushrooms are eaten by people as well as animals. Pigs, cows, donkeys, deer, moose, reindeer, squirrels, turtles, mice, and kangaroos love mushrooms as much as I do.

The Kaibab squirrel of Arizona is a very picky eater. Captive squirrels reject all other food when mushrooms are available.

In India and Pakistan the OYSTER MUSHROOM (Pleurotus eryngii) is dried and fed to donkeys. In America our donkeys eat oats and we eat the mushrooms.

Siberian reindeer are said to be crazy about FLY AGARIC (Amanita muscaria). It seems to make them happy and perhaps has some medicinal value.

Kinds of Mushrooms

Once I went mushroom hunting with a friend, and she found something horrifying. It looked like a piece of cheese with drops of blood on it. I had never seen such a mushroom before, and the guidebook identified it as red-juice tooth (Hydnellum peckii).

This is the wonderful thing about mushrooms. Almost every time I go hunting, I find one I've never seen. Mushrooms come in an unbelievable variety of shapes and sizes. Conifer coral mushrooms look like frozen waterfalls made of cream. Morels can be strangely textured, like brown or black honeycombs. Chanterelles are completely different, like bright orange trumpets lighting up the dark forest. Shaggy parasols resemble hats, and mycenas might be tiny umbrellas.

The list goes on and on, and still new mushrooms are being found. There are many things we do not know about mushrooms, so there is a lot of room for new discoveries about them.

Learning about Mushrooms

One October my older brother Dima, who is a great mushroom hunter, rode out on his bicycle and came back red faced, with his backpack stuffed with honey mushrooms. I was a little girl, and I watched in amazement as he emptied his backpack. The mushrooms just kept coming and coming and coming, like circus clowns from a car. They took up the whole table. Honey mushrooms are like sponges. You can squish them and they spring back to their original shape.

While we cleaned the mushrooms, Dima made me smell them and touch them. "Pay attention," he said. "See how the legs are long and stringy? See how the caps are hairy and humped?" Then he said, "Do we call them honey mushrooms because bees like them?" "Yes," I guessed. "Dumbbell!" he said. "We call them that because they're the color of honey."

This was the way I learned to identify mushrooms.

To identify the mushrooms I do not know, I consult my guidebooks, comparing the different pictures and descriptions, and I make spore prints. The color of the spore prints is a reliable help in identification. I never eat a mushroom I am not absolutely sure of.

Honey mushrooms grow on trees or stumps, like a bouquet of flowers. If you try to pull one from the tree, you get the surrounding ones as well. They are connected by the mycelium in the wood.

To make a spore print:

1. Find a ripe mushroom, not too young, not too old. Supermarket mushrooms work fine.

2. Cut off the leg.

3. Put the cap on a white piece of paper, gill- or pore-side down.

4. Cover the cap with a drinking glass.

5. Leave it alone, and within two to twenty-four hours you will find a beautiful print on the paper.

Identifying Mushrooms

Because some mushrooms are dangerous to eat, hunters must be able to absolutely identify their catch. It is not always easy to identify mushrooms. When I find an unfamiliar mushroom, I bring it home, identify it in three separate guidebooks, consult my mushroom friends, and throw it away. Then I wait until I have found that particular mushroom enough times that I can recognize it without the guide. Then and only then do I eat it.

You also need to feel its texture. Some mushrooms are hard like wood, others are brittle like crackers, and some feel smooth like cheddar cheese or soft as butter. Consider where and when the mushroom grew, and smell it. Many mushrooms smell like the earth, but some smell like licorice, some like garlic, others like cucumbers, and some like swimming pools.

Like humans, mushrooms change as they grow older. Young ones are fresh looking and firm. Old ones are scarred, tattered, tough, and often soggy. The cap changes shape and color. The leg usually just gets longer.

WHAT KIND OF MUSHROOM IS THIS?

This mushroom has a cap and a leg.

• The cap is orange and rounded, with raised scales.

• The leg is bulbous, light orange, with a ring and scales.

• Under the cap the gills are pale yellow and even.

• The mushroom is medium sized, about 3 inches high.

• When cut, the flesh is white. It doesn't change color when you touch it.

• It was found under a conifer.

• The smell is pleasant.

It is an Amanita flavoconia, also known as yellow patches.

Where Mushrooms Live

Mushrooms grow everywhere, and wherever I am, there they are. When I expect to find mushrooms somewhere, however, I never do. Once I went all the way to Siberia because it is famous as a place where mushrooms are found in great abundance, but of course I found nothing. On the other hand, I have also found them where I never thought they could grow, such as in the desert.

In Moscow, where I grew up, there is an enormous museum in the center of the city. One day the sidewalks around the museum began to lift up quite mysteriously. People thought there must have been an earthquake or underground explosion. But when they looked under the sidewalks, they found thousands and thousands of white button mushrooms. Years before, there had been a stable on that spot and the ground was still rich with horse manure. The manure fed these tiny mushrooms that together lifted giant slabs of sidewalk!

So you can see how stubborn and insistent mushrooms are. They can grow almost anywhere — underwater, in snowbanks, in sand, in backyards, baseball fields, city streets, and even in your carpet after a flood. According to mushroom author David Arora, some mysterious coprinus mushrooms once invaded the floor of his car!

Mushroom Hunting

The best place to hunt mushrooms is a forest, but finding them there isn't always easy. It's important not to be lazy and to examine everything, because mushrooms can look like leaves or bark or flowers. To be a successful hunter, it helps to know where and when mushrooms grow. Often you find mushrooms among tree roots. The side of a forest road might reward you. Shady riverbanks and lakeshores are a good bet. Be sure, too, to look under fir trees and in any mossy areas. And remember, many mushrooms return to the same spots year after year. Once you find your first mushroom, an amazing thing happens. Others follow.

Where I live, the best time to go mushroom hunting is the fall. That's true for most of Europe, too. That is when I find the greatest variety, because most mushrooms like the rain and cooler weather. But I wouldn't look for morels in the fall because they grow only in the spring. In the summer I watch for chanterelles and slippery jacks.

When I find a mushroom, I first try to identify it. Then I might just touch it gently and leave it be. Or I might keep it to use as a decoration. But usually I will put it in my basket and bring it home to eat. I think of mushrooms as food. Some I dry for winter soups, some I pickle, and some I cook for a feast the very same day I find them. Those mushrooms that I do not recognize I bring home in a separate bag to identify.

The quickest and easiest way to learn how to hunt mushrooms is to go to the woods with experienced mushroom hunters. They'll show mushrooms to you and name them; they'll tell you when's the best time to go mushroom hunting in your area. They might share recipes and maybe even bring you home for a mushroom dinner. But don't expect them to tell you their favorite mushroom patches! To find these people, phone your local mycological society.

When I go mushrooming, I wear old sneakers, a long-sleeved shirt, and long pants to protect me from ticks and brambles, I take a knife and my basket and a couple of brown bags so I can separate unknown and possibly poisonous mushrooms from the others. (Never put mushrooms in plastic; they need to breathe.) And I always take along an apple and a sandwich in case I get hungry, because you can't eat wild mushrooms raw.

Poisonous Mushrooms

When I was first learning about mushrooms, my brother Dima made sure I was scared to death of the poisonous ones. He told me if I even touched a destroying angel and then put my finger in my mouth, I would drop dead on the spot. Of course this was completely untrue. You can handle any mushroom, even a poisonous one, but if you lick, bite, or eat a poisonous mushroom, it can make you sick.

Never, never, never eat a mushroom you do not recognize. Poisonous mushrooms are powerful. They can kill you. There are just a few truly poisonous mushrooms, so learn to identify these first. When you know to avoid them, you will feel proud and safe.

People who think they may have eaten a poisonous mushroom should immediately contact their poison control center. If you can, save a sample of the suspicious mushroom for identification. Here are two to watch out for.

Beware of the LBMs! LBM stands for Little Brown Mushroom. These mushrooms are quite common and some of them are very dangerous.

Every part of the destroying angel is deadly, even the spores.

Of all the thousands of mushrooms in the world, only a small proportion are poisonous. Most of these will only upset your stomach. Very few mushrooms are deadly. But those that are can kill you. Because of the achievements of modern medicine, only about 5 percent of people who eat deadly mushrooms don't survive. But ... never take a risk. Never eat any wild mushroom you cannot identify. WHEN IN DOUBT, THROW IT OUT!

The Destroying Angel

Some poisonous mushrooms are not very distinctive looking. The destroying angel is. Other mushrooms may look misshapen or dirty or infested, but never this one. It is always absolutely beautiful, slender, shiny, and intensely white. It stands there in the dark woods, gleaming, a vicious queen of death who calls to you, "Come pick me! Eat me!" And you know that this beauty has death in it.

The destroying angel is said to be delicious, and after eating it people live for some time without feeling the least effect. Then, quite suddenly, they get violently ill and some eventually die. But the destroying angel is easy to identify, and there is no need to be afraid of it if you're watchful.

The destroying angel has a homely and poisonous sister called the death cap (Amanita phalloides), which has a greenish or yellow tint, but both have a ring at the top of the leg and the same sac around the base of the leg.