twilight mushrooms

I'm in the forest with my eldest son Louie and our getting on a bit but still completely mad and out of control dog Katy. We are on a mushroom foraging mission.  Armed with our trusty guide book of edible mushrooms my son informs me that we are on the look out for chanterelles. They're easy to spot, he says, thumbing to the poisonous section of the guide book, but they're very similar to the false chanterelle which can make you really sick.


I look at the picture of the false chanterelle and then at the picture of the edible chanterelle, I can barely see any difference.  We scour the leafy forest floor and I spot some yellow mushrooms.  We look at the book.  My son says he is almost practically one hundred percent certain that they are chanterelles.  I look at the photo of the false chanterelles and cannot tell. I give a little facial grimace and Louie fixes me with a dont you trust your own son look.  We bag them.


I have my camera with me in the hope of spotting some deer.  I realise there is fat chance of that happening with me and Louie yelling at each other to look at our mushroom finds. I do however manage to take some photos of brown stuff to join in the end of Poppytalks Autumn Colour Week.

See it here

Some colour Brown

and some more brown nature stuff over at my flickr

We arrive home with a very tired dog that still manages to run off as soon as I let her out of the car and a bag full of mushrooms.  This includes a whole bunch of bright purple mushrooms that are called Amythyst Deceivers.

I cannot work out whether it's the fact that that they are purple that makes me feel uneasy or that their name includes the word deceiver.  Louie assures me that they are fine and and are absolutely not some other kind of poisonous funghi that are the same shape, grow in the same place at the same time but are pinkish lilac rather than purple.

Phew, that's okay then I think as I fry them up with some garlic for brunch.

Yum