To not go mushroom foraging with my teenage son

[Patchwork21]

14ds has a fascination with mushrooms. He's researched and says he knows there are certain types that are 100 percent easy to identify as safe to eat. He wants me to go with him to pick some and them bring them home to eat. I said no, as I have no experience whatsoever with mushrooms. He says I'm irrational and lots of parents take their children mushroom picking 🍄

I grew up doing this every autumn with my uncle. I personally hated it at the time (ants would eat us) but it's really not that hard to identify the basic ones. There are some that are tricky, just don't touch those. My uncle would take a tiny nibble of those and your tongue would immediately tickle if they were the wrong kind.
I would go for it. How rare nowadays for a 14 year old to want to do something with their parents. I don't blame you for not wanting the risk- sounds like you've done a great job raising him!

Just to add, it always made my uncle amazed that forests here are untouched. In Poland they are completely bare in foraging season! Forests full of people picking them and often selling them on the side of the street. It's not unheard of for kids to get foraging knives as presents.

Suggest Berry picking instead? Far safer and taste far nicer!

@justcheckingreally

Just to add, it always made my uncle amazed that forests here are untouched. In Poland they are completely bare in foraging season! Forests full of people picking them and often selling them on the side of the street. It's not unheard of for kids to get foraging knives as presents.

I am not far from Poland and if you don't get to forest by Sunrise, you are too late😂 I got my little knife at 5 or 6.

@Wazzzzzzzup hahaha same! Maybe the ants and the early morning is what made me dislike it. I have very fond memories of waking up to tons of mushrooms on the kitchen table and my uncle making us scrambled egg with them.

It was extremely common to do in Russia where ai grew up and no one died

It's not common in the UK and I don't know who you'd trust to identify them.

I have been in other countries where there is always a local expert, often the pharmacist, who will look at what you've gathered and, being local, with easily recognise them.

Yes, definitely a led walk (might be free with a local wildlife organisation), or a course. Field mushrooms are pretty simple to identify but always better safe than sorry.

You could add on a bit of sloe picking and make sloe gin?

Used to go mushroom picking as a kid too. There is nothing like fresh mushrooms. In France, you can take your foraged mushrooms to some pharmacies and they check them.

YANBU, mushroom poisoning is no joke. However, the Boletus Edulis is hard to mistake for anything bad. Read up on basics, and just don't touch anything you're not sure about.

My FIL used to pick them in the fields around their home. He had no idea of their names, but just recognised the ones he had always picked. I wouldn't fancy it using just a book though!

You could go looking for blackberries (a bit late maybe), sloes, nuts, chestnuts, apples etc. It was all the rage in the 70s, and I've still got Food For Free by Richard Mabey.

I would agree with the berry comment too - as long as he doesn't mistake deadly nightshade for blackcurrant

Besides if you want wild food you can't survive on mushroom alone 😁

It will also get him into the habit of looking very closely to various identification markers and passing anything he is unsure about

Fair enough it's plants not mushrooms, but when he does go mushroom picking he will have learned that the devil is in the detail

I have been in other countries where there is always a local expert, often the pharmacist, who will look at what you've gathered and, being local, with easily recognise them.

Not true where i'm from. However, we learned mushrooms as a part of primary school curriculum.

I got a brilliant book for my birthday and there are a few which are fairly easy due to location / time of year etc but a lot which aren't. This book is so well balanced, it's brilliant, and also have sections on the legalities of foraging and collecting.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1781256225/ref=cmswwrcppawdbimmm_A470Q5QE5N8EZ7TCPCCX

See if your local National Trust property has any foraging courses this autumn. I would NOT eat any mushrooms I'd foraged. You need an expert to say what they are. Some look very similar!

Like they say, all fungi are edible ... once 💀

@PigletJohn

It's not common in the UK and I don't know who you'd trust to identify them.

I have been in other countries where there is always a local expert, often the pharmacist, who will look at what you've gathered and, being local, with easily recognise them.

Literally never heard of that where I grew up. We just wing it I guess 😂

I do this with my son but I don't eat them! Even though I'm sure I've found a patch of ceps and oyster mushrooms

I have an app on my phone which identifies mushrooms.

As teens we went magic mushroom picking 😬 I don't tell him about those 😂

Some edible mushrooms have unique identifiers, some are very close in features to some poisonous ones... if you get a good guide it would tell you, then you could avoid eating any that might be a mistaken identity and just stick to the obvious ones. wild 'shrooms are yum.

@CatsArePeople

YANBU, mushroom poisoning is no joke. However, the Boletus Edulis is hard to mistake for anything bad. Read up on basics, and just don't touch anything you're not sure about.

I would add an absolute basic of Boletus chrysenteron to that. Saw quite a lot of them around. Very easy to identify

I started mushroom foraging over lockdown with no prior knowledge.

There’s quite a few mushrooms that’s there’s no mistaking that they’re edible (chicken of the woods) for example.

If you’re on Facebook there’s quite a few nice communities that’s always happy to help with identifying. Maybe ask him to come up with three mushrooms that are easy to identify (if he’s done any research he’ll be able to come up that that) then go out foraging. If there’s any I don’t know (there’s only a few that I do know) I take pictures and post on Facebook for next time.

It’s actually a really nice hobby that’s strangely addicting, I think of it being the nature version of Pokemon go, as once you start looking out for mushrooms they’re everywhere!

It was extremely common to do in Russia where ai grew up and no one died

No one?

https://apnews.com/34154ac0df043005de823ccc2e320054

www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2000-jul-16-mn-53777-story.html

People regularly die or become very ill even in countries where mushroom picking is traditional and very common. That doesn't mean that you shouldn't do it but it pays to be extremely careful.

what puts me off (and may put him off) is that I have seen on many foraging sites, the instruction to put foraged mushrooms into salt water to get the beasties out before you cook them! I do think a foraging course might be a nice idea for him though but I'd be saying no to DIY!

@godmum56

what puts me off (and may put him off) is that I have seen on many foraging sites, the instruction to put foraged mushrooms into salt water to get the beasties out before you cook them! I do think a foraging course might be a nice idea for him though but I'd be saying no to DIY!

But you lose extra protein like that 😂 We used to just clean them. You can see when they are full of warms😳

Worms

Apparently if you do know it's practically impossible to get it wrong. An Eastern Eyropean friend who grew up where foraging mushrooms us something "everyone" does says its would be like getting oranges and applel mixed up, so if he's done his research...