wildmushroomsonline.co.uk
Search:-
  Home     Meet Other Foragers     Browse Categories     Site Map     Guided Foraging Sessions  
Newsletter Signup
User Name
Email Address
Security code

 
Latest Foraging Trips
 - Submit your latest finds!
Show others what you have found. Share your foraging story and talk with others. Learn about wild foods and wild mushrooms
 - Arrange a Foraging Trip
 - You accept the terms. when using this site
 - Be social! please click the facebook or twitter icons below and share this site with your friends
Hi all
I found three of these last Autumn, now I'm 99% sure what they are but the shape is different to other pictures I have seen. (I think it may b
  Read More..
Hi
Can anyone please tell me what these are? I took one to do a spore print which was an off white-creamy colour at first but I left it for a few day
  Read More..
Hi all new to wild mushroom hunting, been down my local wood today with not much joy. I was just woundering if anyone knows any good places around the
  Read More..
View All | Post Your Latest Foraging Trip
Featured Articles
Follow me on Twitter
Bookmark this post in Facebook Tweet this post Digg this post Bookmark this post in delicious Bookmark this post in Stumbleupon Bookmark this post in Blinklist Bookmark this post in Google Bookmarks Mail this post
wildmushroomonline.co.uk Invasion of the Monster Honey Fungus
Post Comments

buy wild mushrooms, Honey Fungus

Buy Mushrooms Online

Invasion of the Monster Honey Fungus


Hated by horticulturalists, Honey Fungus (Armillaria) is one of our most common fungi.  For a while this Autumn, it seemed like it was trying to take over the whole country. The largest single organism on Earth is an Armillaria mycelium which covers nine square kilometres.  This is a species which should be treated with a healthy degree of caution by novice foragers. It should not be eaten until you are confident that you know everything else you might confuse it with and how to safely cook it and  even then you should only try a little at first, because many people are allergic or find it indigestible.  However, once you know it, it’s reasonably easy to identify. Usually, that is. 

Back in October, I was en-route to a foraging trip and spotted what looked like Honey Fungus sprawled out along a hundred-metre section of the central reservation of the A23 in Crawley.  Maybe not the ideal location for foraging, but I was with a novice and it was a good opportunity to take a look at what just what Honey Fungus is capable of when it decides to go on the rampage.  Honey Fungus spreads itself via bootlace-like rhizomorphs which travel underground searching for new hosts (which can be dead or alive - it's not that choosy.)  

I parked the car and made my way to the first area of fruiting bodies and sure enough, this was Honey Fungus (Armillaria mellea in this case).

 
 

As we continued down the reservation, I spotted something than I initially believed was definitely not Honey Fungus.  I didn't have a clue what it actually was.

 
I've seen a lot of Honey Fungus over the years, but never anything that looked remotely like this.  On the contrary, the only thing this bears any resemblance to are the morels and helvellas.  I then noticed some other patches, this time in the process of growing their "brains."

 

There were two possible alternatives.  Either this was a new parasitic fungus or it was some sort of mutation.  At this point I required assistance, since I have neither the equipment nor the knowledge to be able to tell whether this was of any interest to the  professional mycologists.  It turned out that the microscopy posed more questions than it answered.  It's not a parasite.  You can tell this partly by examining a cross-section…

 

…but there is more conclusive evidence than that.  The true gills of these mushrooms have no spore-producing basidia at all; they are completely sterile.  If that wasn't strange enough in itself, the brain-like growths on the top did have basidia and were producing spores fit for A. mellea.  Perhaps these oddities can shed some light on the evolutionary history of the morels.  It may have been a mutation just like this one which led to their own brain-like structures.  The technical term for this is a "morel-like teratological form", and is reasonably well-known in certain species, although not, to my knowledge, this one ("teratological" just means "visibly or grossly malformed.")

It even occurred to me that maybe there could be a business opportunity here.  People pay lots of money for morels, honey fungus is edible, maybe I should deliberately try to grow these mushrooms and sell them as an unusual delicacy!  In the end I didn't even have the courage to sample them myself.  They almost certainly are edible, but there just seemed to be something a little too weird about these mushrooms.

Foraging Notes

Identification: Can be tricky.  Hugh Fearnly-Whittingstall managed to get it wrong, mistaking the poisonous Sulphur Tuft (Hypholoma fasciculare) for Honey Fungus  There are numerous other species that an unwary forager could confuse them with, including some which are considerably more dangerous than Sulphur Tuft (Galerina species, for example.)  The easiest way to check you've got Honey Fungus is to go searching for the rhizomorphs and the white mycelial sheets which can be found beneath the bark of infected trees. 

Consumption: Honey Fungus is a complex of species which were all until recently lumped together as A. mellea.   There are now at least four subspecies known in the UK, some of which are considered more likely to be slightly poisonous or trigger allergies.  Up to 10% of people are effected, so do your homework and take care.   Before eating they must be boiled and the water thrown away before frying or including in a stew or casserole.   Some people rate them quite highly, personally I only eat them if I fail to find anything better.   They're food, at least.

 
wildmushroomonline.co.uk Comments
Post Comments
Posted By,  Val on May 17,2010
 
I like them very much,they taste fantastic,one of my fav mushroom,very popular in poland.
Posted By,  HoloDromy on June 23,2010
 
How I can write PM to other users? Thanx
Posted By,  Milioriking on September 29,2010
 
Hi forum, cool weather and good mood. life is a good thing however turn
Posted By,  thereforcer on November 3,2010
 
Hi, here you can find tons of beuty videos and photos. Enjoy us and be happy!
Posted By,  maxxxmagician on November 9,2010
 
:)
Posted By,  thesunshining on November 13,2010
 
Hi, today is a beautiful day in my life. I saw a first snow in this year and I save this photo for all people in the World!
Post Your Comment Here :
Name *
E-mail Address *   (We use this to alert you if anyone comments on your post.)
Comments *
  Click Here To Upload Photos    (Images should be .JPG format and no bigger than 1MB in size.)
Are You Human?*

    
You use this content at your own risk, we are not responsible for content posted, by posting, you accept these terms.

Wild Mushroom Identification - Recommended Books for All Skill Levels:
Every amateur mycologist should have a decent library of books, here are the top five books I highly recommend for wild mushroom identification:
 
1) Field Guide to Edible Mushrooms of Britain and Europe  - Great layout with superb images - Peter Jordan
2) Mushroom Picker's Foolproof Field Guide  - A good all round book - Peter Jordan
3) The Mushroom Book - This one is a proper belter with loads and loads of good technical data - Thomas Laessoe
4) Complete Mushroom Book: The Quiet Hunt  - A lovely book by a lovely man. Antonio Carluccio
5) The River Cottage Handbook - Mushrooms - Always a favourite from Hugh's fungi specialist friend, John Wright

It is important to have at least 3 books so you can cross reference and cover as many species as possible