Early season morel sightings

[harvey lee]

After many hours or shall we say about 12 hours of looking, I scored well this morning.

I found approx 45 greys and 70 nice yellows.

Looks like steak and sauteed morels for supper and a few for the neighbors.

[Jim Uran]

Wish I was your neighbor!!

I struck out last night, only little tiny ones. More rain coming tomorrow and friday though, so this weekend might pan out.

[harvey lee]

It was a wierd day for me even with finding as many as I did.

Typically I can locate them by a dying elm with the bark half off. Today, the only place I could find them was by a group of dying elm with prickly ash and very heavy ground cover.

Usually I can find a few by a single tree and when walking from tree to tree but today that did not produce at all.

Seems like where I was looking the ground moisture was plentiful.

I have another good spot that typically does well and I may also hit that today for an hour or so to see if I can get a bunch more. I have others who love them but are not able to go out picking so I always try to get each family one nice meal.

[Burchoid]

Founds these the other day, mostly under 1 elm:

[DTro]

Stop it!

I need to squeeze in some fishing

Nice find

[harvey lee]

Well, after cleaning the batch I picked this am, I thought after eating I might as well go out to an old spot I have not been to for years.

I pulled up and there was a tree that was dying and looked like it was not dead for long. I stepped into a gold mine of yellows and picked 67 of them. I never even got to the place I wanted to look which I will now hit tomorrow am. They were all within 4ft of the tree. Solid yellows.

I will post a picture of this afternoons batch later today.

[harvey lee]

Went to take some pics but my wife has the camera in the car.

Oh well, maybe tomorrow if the picking is as good as today.

[hunt4food]

Yesterday I posted about my find of Half free morels. After getting home and cutting one open, I discovered the dreaded white cotton looking fuzz inside of them. they were indeed not the edibles ones, but very close looking. If you are just gettin into this hobby (ok. Obsession!!), make sure you utilize the internet and a good mushroom book and double double check a few resources before eating anything you are not positive is ok to eat. I nearly made a mistake!

[gopher_nation]

Not to mention you could also contaminate the edible ones if you throw them all in the same sack. Be certain of what you pick and throw in with your bounty.

[leech~~]

harvey, great to hear about the finds. You sounded a little down in the dumps on your report the other day of checking 5 spots with nothing to show.

I think the rain helped a lot as I too checked one spot and found nothing and went back the very next day after the rain and found a good little load!

[leech~~]

Yesterday I posted about my find of Half free morels. After getting home and cutting one open, I discovered the dreaded white cotton looking fuzz inside of them. they were indeed not the edibles ones, but very close looking. If you are just gettin into this hobby (ok. Obsession!!), make sure you utilize the internet and a good mushroom book and double double check a few resources before eating anything you are not positive is ok to eat. I nearly made a mistake!

hunt4food, thanks for getting back to everyone with what you found out. Mistake or not it may help others learn what to watch out for. There are some bad schrooms out there.

[NELS-BELLS]

Anyone finding any around the St. Cloud area? Its been so dry here although we did get a half inch of rain on Saturday.

Nels

[gopher_nation]

I haven't found any around St. Cloud yet. Did get some in the cities but comparing growth of all other plants it seems that they are quite a bit ahead of us. Still pretty cool during the nights, a little more rain and some warmer temps and we'll be in business too.

I haven't seen any fungal growth when I have been out around St. Cloud.

[Redlantern]

Somebody got a pic of an elm tree this time of year? I can't even identify them much less find a morel. Been looking at pics in a tree book but that doesn't seem to help. I'm looking in the Wild River State Park area. Thanks in advance.

[slimer]

Just look for dead trees without leaves that have bark peeling off or no bark at all. MOre than likely its an elm!

[Pagz]

Yeah, what slimer said. Of two spots that I found them one had big elms and sparse aspen the other had mostly poplar,sugar maple and a few elm. Both places had some large trees both standing and dead on the ground. Seemed like there was always some patches of raised moss within a foot of each mushroom in one area.Almost like they were old decayed stumps of trees. Both areas were near water but did not look like they would ever flood

All I can say is keep trying. It took me some time before I found my first patch. When I did find one I would crouch down near the ground and that seemed to help locate others.

[HotPocket]

[Matt Breuer]

I've been out and checked several areas without much luck in the Bemidji area. I've found a handful of tiny buggers and that's it. Haven't spoken with a soul who has found anything so far aside from some babies and stems. Hoping they pop soon....

Does anyone pick puff balls? Man I've been finding piles of them!

[DARK30]

I've never seen a puff ball this time of year. They cook up real nice too!

Yesterday, I noticed a couple yellows sitting right out in the backyard under one of the apple trees.

[leech~~]

I don't think that you will find them by Oak or Cotton wood trees and there seems to be lots of those around. I think I have checked maybe over 30 spots in the last few years before I found the few that had schrooms in them. It can get frustrating at times. The real problem is being there at the right time.

You could check a woods this week thinking there are no schrooms growning there and next week they could be popping up like crazy! But you got to keep looking.

What's everyones "Tick count" so far this year? I only found 4 so far, well 5 if you count the one my wife says she got from me!

[Redlantern]

Really heavy on the ticks in my area. Both woodticks and deerticks.

[harvey lee]

Well it was a slow morning. I did pick 34 with most being greys. Seems the forest floor is getting very dry in some locations. Some rain in the next few days would really help.

I found alot more that I did not pick as they were getting dry to say the least.

C,mon rain.

The last 3 days I have been in the woods about 11-12 hours and I have only found 2 ticks. Thats the least I have found on me for years. I have one woods that when I pick there for a few hours I will have 15-20 ticks on me. Today I was there with 1 tick.

[Matt Breuer]

I've never seen puffs this early either, don't they usually pop in mid-summer? I thought they may have been baby fly agarics, but I popped a couple open and they were indeed puffballs. They were small, about the side of a quarter. I left them un-picked.

The ticks seem to really be concentrated up here. When I hit a spot where I find one on my pant leg, I'll find 10 more. Between hunting 'shrooms and taking the dogs for jaunts I bet I've yanked close to 50 or 60 already. That's in less than 8 hours of woods time.

[DARK30]

My Son and I picked 75 yellows this afternoon...no dry ones.

Theres plenty of woodticks tho. I picked around ten off the dog just bewtween his ears. I gave one to my wife too...she had to leave an important board meeting to go get it off...LOL!

[croixeyes]

Ive only had 3 ticks on me this season,thats a shock cause one of my spots I go to has alot of tall grass to pass thru.But I did go there during the cold rain last week,I think that helped alot.....COMEON RAIN!!!!!!!!Headin out tomorrow am..