Yesterdays walk

Yesterday I managed to get out for about an hour and a half between the arrival of sunshine and the inevitable clap of thunder. Because of the limitations on my time I was not as thorough in my search as I would have been otherwise. My goal was to check out the tulip poplars. I zigzaged thru the wood working across the slope going from tulip poplar to tulip poplar and checking out likely elms. Some of the tree are quite large and some are rather small but the leaves give them all away. I found nothing. Not even an old dried up moldy morel that I could take home as a trophy just to prove that I didn't get skunked.

by Joe  Contact Me

The late season morels

The posts that I saw early on seemed to be in agreement that "Morels were everywhere!" That was probably an overstatement but I can tell you that we had our best year ever. No we didn't get a truck load but we did get enough to eat fresh, enjoy with our asparagus and to try out a few new recipes. I dried some for later use.

There has been a pattern: a lot of walking and one tree making the difference between a good and not so good day. Apple trees produced for us early in the season and then the elms. I'm hoping that the tulip poplars will produce the final flush.

We found more half free morels than ever before. We did well with them at Mingo finding them spread out like chanterelles in the woods. We got about a dozen and a half of them. It's a shame that they are so fragile and do not transport well. One of our best finds, of yellows, at Mingo was as we were headed back to the car after the afternoon walk.

I desperately want to get out and scout but I'm not thrilled about getting soaked and chilled to the bone doing it. I'm hoping for some breaks in the weather the next few days.

When do the first black trumpets appear? We've had enough rain but I believe that it's early in the season. LBMs are showing up in my yard. I'm keeping an eye out for the first horse mushrooms but there will be time for that later on. Right now my focus is on morels.

I've never found a morel in the sixteen inch category. I found my biggest one this year a bit smaller than a softball. My dream is to find a spot where the morels grow like wild flowers and I can gather over a hundred under one tree. Perhaps some day...

One lesson that I'm learning the hard way is that the people who always, I mean always, find a lot of morels (or any mushroom) have a list of spots that consistently produce for them. Some of those spots have been in the family for years and are passed down from generation to generation. Newbie's like me do a lot of walking and hope…

by Joe  Contact Me

More morels.

My family and I went out yesterday and it was a great day to be in the woods. Too bad so many of the morels are beginning to dry up. We do so desperately need rain. I doubt that even an all night soaker would do much for the morels now unless that rain would produce another flush. I've yet to find any morels under tulip poplar trees. Elm seems to be the favorite so now. Initially it was apple but now it seems to be elm. Maybe a rain will get them going under tulip poplar trees.

I'm hoping to scout another area today. Last year was a terrible year for morels and I did a lot of fruitless walking but I did take note of some areas that could be productive and followed up on them. But on the other hand we found them in areas that we had not foraged in before. Sometime the Good Lord just needs to smile on you. Just finding one productive tree can make all of the difference in the world.

by Joe  Contact Me

Morel Season Near The End?

This has been our best year ever for finding morels but is the season ending? Perhaps it is in my neck of the woods. Many of the morels that we found the past few days were drying because of the lack of rain.

by Joe  Contact Me

Mingo

We had a blast at Mingo on Saturday. We didn't hit the mother lode of morels but we came away with a respectable quantity of 66 yellows and 22 half frees. Some of those were what we have come to call soup morels. Those are the ones that are about an inch or so tall. Our best find was on a steep slope headed back to the car. Were we not trying to take a shortcut we would have missed out.

We also went up to the Mingo observatory.but unfortunately it was cloudy and we couldn't use the scopes, but we did get to view their sky show. They have a very nice setup there. Someday I'm going to make it to one of the star parties.

Sunday mama and I went out and found twenty eight more most of them were soup morels.

Yesterday I found five yellows. One of those was about six inches tall the rest about three inches tall. Everything I found was under one tree an elm that looked too far gone to produce anything. That has been the pattern this year. The difference between a good day and an ok day has been finding one tree with a number of morels beneath it.

We desperately need rain. The morels that I found were beginning to dry out.

This is the best season that we've had. I think that has more to do with the power of prayer than my skills as a morel hunter.

I have yet to find a single morel under a tulip poplar this year. Most of the soup morels were scattered under or near cherry trees and I never found anything under cherry until this year.

One thing I learned from LaMonte at Mingo was to observe the spread of the branches and to look for morels out to the drip line. That should be the size of the root ball.

I have a couple of spots that I want to check out. I may do some scouting today.

by Joe  Contact Me