I’ve been heavily involved in rehearsals for, and performance of a play the local theatre group just put on this past weekend. As a result, I’m so pressed for time and have been forced into the re-post mode. This essay was originally published in the book of childhood essays I had published in November of 2017. Since that time, nothing much has changed in terms of this overriding passion myself and a lot of family and friends have for mushroom foraging. It’s so much fun and right now it seems rather appropriate to re-post the essay. This one looks like it’ll turn into an annual re-post every year about this time. Enjoy!! My play experience is the subject of the next essay (9/9/22) by the way.

“Covert Fungi

 Foraging”

A few people often think of late summer in the San Juan Mountains of Southwest Colorado as a sad time of year. You’re moving into the tail end of the summer season, and things are just beginning their inevitable wind down. Everything that was once green is now beginning to faintly put on its fall colors of yellow and orange. The wildflowers are just past their glorious peak-which was a fairytale multitude of colors on display only a few short weeks ago. The sunlight each day is beginning to wane, and with it the corresponding darkness getting a bit longer as each day draws to a close. Other than vampires and other semi-mythical creatures of the night, who in their right mind would be happy right about now? Believe it or not, some folks are extremely excited during this time of the year, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with the opening of NFL Training camps.

My family, and a number of people I know in my hometown start to keep an almost religious-like watch on the weather patterns from day-to-day for one very important reason. If you get the right amount of summer monsoon rain still kicking in, then add to that just a pinch of late summer warmth thrown in for good measure. Precede this by nice sunlight still poking through the clouds for extended periods of time. The perfect convergence of all these factors happening at once over the next month or so results in an amazing phenomenon. Mushrooms, or fungal spores, start popping up in meadows all over the mountains. Yes, wild capsular plant life on display for all to openly gaze at, and even to reach out and touch.

No, I’m not talking about the model Grateful Dead fans feed upon in profuse amounts, but the kind of fungal spores you can actually eat and not get violent (or pleasant) flashbacks of your youth. The type of mushroom that if you happen to munch on a few, doesn’t result in multiple visits to the porcelain throne, or emergency trips to your local hospital ICU unit. Edible mushrooms that one can be freely pick in the forest? That taste pretty darn good if prepared in just the right way? Yes indeed grasshopper.

Another interesting phenomenon also takes place in conjunction with this explosion of forest fungi. This one somewhat more mysterious in nature, and a complete transformation of character on the part of the individuals it happens to. Covert, or hidden mushroom hunting sites.

You may be asking yourself, why would anyone who likes to hunt for mushrooms try to keep the various locations of these capsular plants such a guarded secret? One very simple reason my dear Watson. Most serious mushroom hunters strongly want to keep desirable round cap locations a secret because these sites are such magical places. Weather ingredients have converged in just the right amounts at these precise spots, and the end result is of course an explosion of the precise type of mushroom you’re searching for. Why not keep the location of your finds such a guarded secret? One would be a total fool to reveal secrets such as this.

Examples of this quirky behavior concerning mushroom sites are quite profuse. In my younger years when I felt quite confidently that most people under the age of about thirty could

safely walk through walls without sustaining any sort of physical damage, many was the time I’d be running through the forest. Only to suddenly bump head long into various locals out on one of their covert fungi forays.  The pattern was always the same in these awkward situations. I’d smile at the realization that I’d run into someone I knew back in town. Then ask them innocently enough what their party was doing out in the nature on that particular day.

I’m quite sure the behavior on their part didn’t vary too much either. They’d look at me somewhat suspiciously (after all, I’ve always enjoyed hunting for fungal spores too), then with a guilty look painted all over their faces, state quite sheepishly that they were just out enjoying the beauty of nature that day.  Of course they were. In addition to that, I know of some prime beachfront property for sale at an unbelievably cheap price on the coast of Greenland.

I’d inevitably return to my forest jaunt using the lame excuse that if I stood there for too long my muscles would get sore. While the parties I’d just run into would try mightily to figure out new and innovative ways to hide the fact that they’d just run into me. Three days later, both parties would return to said site looking for further evidence of new fungal displays, and neither of us would mention anything about the inconvenient encounter of the previous week. The secret magic spot had been discovered, and now everybody felt about like the natives did a few hundred years after Columbus had planted his flag on their shores.

Another convenient way to hide the location of these secret spots is to circumvent the entire mushroom hunting process from the very beginning. Nip things in the bud as it were. A sizable number of locals I know quite frequently go out on extremely covert hunting expeditions. Trying desperately to hide the fact that they’ve even driven their car once since their last weekly church attendance. This strategy has been known to work extremely effectively.

When you run into them a few days after they’ve gone on their foray, they invariably tell you that this year’s crop is about on the level of decimated cornfield during a Midwest drought. They’ve even given up on going out to look. This despite the fact that we’ve gotten record amounts of rain within the past month, and global warming is really starting to kick in at an unprecedented pace.

I will of course totally agree with them, and state emphatically that we’ve gotten way too much moisture, its become too cold too fast, and mother nature just isn’t cooperating this year. Both parties will graciously say “goodbye” to one another, and go their separate ways.

All the while I’m thinking that if I get to the Treasure of Sierra Madre before they do, the pickings might be fairly good. This thought is exactly the same for my friend/competitor. Only in their case, they’ve already scouted out the magical spot before I did. Thus knowing full well about it’s prime harvesting potential. At that point, we’ve got a race against time for both parties.

Thankfully, the San Juan Mountains happen to be a fairly big area packed into a relatively small space. In other words, there are lots of good spots for almost everyone to stumble upon forest fungi. Just don’t tell your neighbor where exactly those spots happen to be.