We enjoyed our last trip to the Bloedel Reserve enough to become members and membership has its privileges – an annual mushroom walk.

I love the meadow.

First, our guide, Andy, was outstanding – extraordinarily knowledgeable with fantastic stories of growing up on BI, hunting for mushrooms and fungar: knowing where to look for mushrooms.

The following are some of the mushrooms seen on the walk. We saw even more (lobsters, shrimps, …) but given the low light in the forest and lack of a tripod (I was the only one photographing in the group) a lot of photos were just too blurry. So, if you go, walk slowly, look down and enjoy the show!

Fly amanita.

Little brown mushroom, poisonous – don’t eat!

Chantrelle.

These grow only on cones.

Check out the star shape, cool!

While we didn’t sample any of the mushrooms, I did try a seed from Decaisnea fargesii (Blue Sausage Fruit, Dead Man’s Fingers) which tasted a bit like lychee – most didn’t care for it.