|
 Determined
foragers delight in the thrill of harvesting wild morel mushrooms,
Morchella spp, that can’t be bought at a grocery store. Native
mushrooms are incredibly difficult to produce commercially due to a
lack of understanding about the conditions needed to grow them.
“Wild morels definitely rule the spring, but there are quite a
number of other edible mushrooms that can be found in Illinois,
including pheasant backs, chicken-of-the-woods, chanterelles, and my
personal favorite, the hen-of-the-woods,” said Chris Evans, forestry
Extension and research specialist.
Mushrooms are the fruiting bodies of larger organisms called fungi.
Fungi typically grow as a dense mass of thread-like cells called
mycelium. That mycelium collects energy and can produce mushrooms
that release spores for reproduction.
“Think of a mushroom as the apple and the fungus as
the tree,” Evans says. “If you ever pulled loose bark off of a
rotting log, the white or light brown threads that fan out across
the surface is part of the mycelium and is the main body of the
fungus."
There are many different types of fungi, and not all of them produce
mushrooms, but each is important to the health of native ecosystems
by enriching the soil and rotting wood that creates homes for
wildlife.
Fungi do not produce their own food through photosynthesis like
plants. Instead, many attack and feed off other organisms growing on
living trees, dead wood, or the soil.
“Many of our native plant species actually need the help of a fungus
to grow,” Evans says. “These fungi will associate with the roots of
plants to form structures called mycorrhizae that help uptake
nutrients and transport water to the plant roots.”
Morels are saprophytic, meaning they get energy from dead organic
matter. Some other saprophytic mushrooms, such as
chicken-of-the-woods and oyster mushrooms, grow on dead wood.
Edible mycorrhizal mushrooms include chanterelles,
which are some of the most common Illinois mushrooms in the summer,
and truffles which compete with morels as being the most famous wild
mushrooms worldwide. [to top of second
column]
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Illinois is known to have three types of morel:
yellow morel (M. esculenta), black morel (M. elata) and half-free
morel (M. semilibera).
Where do you find morels? Long-time morel enthusiasts have their
go-to spots, sometimes handed down for generations.
“We do know that morels start to pop up in forested areas as early
as March in southern Illinois and typically follows in a matter of
weeks across the state, all based on spring weather,” says
University of Illinois Extension Horticulture Educator Ryan Pankau.
Those who plan to forage mushrooms hunt this spring should be sure
to properly identify any fungi before consumption. Foraging should
also be done safely and sustainably by treading lightly when
off-trail. Many natural areas do not allow collection, so check
ahead.
Allerton Park in east-central Illinois near Monticello is visited by
mushroom hunters every spring.
“While the actual act of picking a morel may have little impact on
woodlands, it's the human disturbance that we worry about,” said
Nate Beccue, Allerton Park natural areas manager.
Sensitive vegetation is emerging along with
mushrooms, and foragers may unintentionally harm other plants.
Spring ephemerals wildflowers that grow in forests only have a small
window of time to complete their life cycle before trees leaf out.
“Allerton’s rule is ‘stay on trails,’ which applies to any activity
in the park,” said Beccue. “It’s meant to protect the one-of-a-kind
resource we have.”
And if you don’t find anything on your quest for mushrooms, try
another day.
“Don’t worry if morels aren’t magically popping out of the
understory on your hunt,” Pankau says. “Any mushroom hunt is
successful if I can observe nature on a nice spring day.”
[SOURCES: Chris Evans, forestry
Extension specialist and research specialist; Ryan Pankau,
horticulture educator] |
