Dilemma - giant funnel cap

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Dilemma - giant funnel cap

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Mat S

Joined: 07 Nov 2004
Posts: 282
Location: Leicester

Posted: Fri Oct 14, 05 4:08 pm Post subject: Dilemma - giant funnel cap

I think I've found a giant funnel cap (Leucopaxillus giganteus) under a dead tree in a local (deciduous) wood. It's huge and I thought it was a piece of discarded plastic or something at first, it's so large and unnaturally white in appearance. It's big, nearly 2 outspread hands across and the flesh, when squeezed, has quite a bit of water and a strong mushroomy smell. The wood is quite old, part - I think - of the old Leicester forest.

Rogers mushrooms website isn't sure of its edibility, the DK mushrooms book I have says 'can cause stomach upsets'. I'd love to harvest it because it's the biggest mushroom I've ever found but a) I don't know how rare it is, I've never found one before and b) I'm not a fan of hugging the porcelain.

Suggestions please!

Mat

ps the rest of the wood is a disgrace - local hoolies have had loads of fires there, there's an unofficial motorbike track round it and the litter in parts has to be seen to be believed. I counted 6 fire extinguishers and 3 broken flourescent tubes amongst the debris.

Treacodactyl
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 25795
Location: Jumping on the bandwagon of opportunism

Posted: Fri Oct 14, 05 4:43 pm Post subject:
If it's so big will it be edible anyway or full of maggots? When I started foraging I thought I shouldn't pick things as they may be rare but I've seen so many shromms just trodden or picked and left I don't think I'll have much of an impact. Where possible I also encourage them anyway.

jema
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Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 28120
Location: escaped from Swindon

Posted: Fri Oct 14, 05 5:52 pm Post subject:

Treacodactyl wrote:

If it's so big will it be edible anyway or full of maggots? When I started foraging I thought I shouldn't pick things as they may be rare but I've seen so many shromms just trodden or picked and left I don't think I'll have much of an impact. Where possible I also encourage them anyway.

I thought with mushrooms that by the time they were pickable, they had already propagated, hence there was no conserventy reason not to pick them?

Treacodactyl
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 25795
Location: Jumping on the bandwagon of opportunism

Posted: Fri Oct 14, 05 5:55 pm Post subject:
If you try and take a spore print from a young fungi often you don't get many so I assume they need to be older to produce their spores.

cab

Joined: 01 Nov 2004
Posts: 32429

Posted: Sat Oct 15, 05 10:42 pm Post subject:

The giant funnel cap is uncommon, not rare as such though. You'll see it once in a while, and you as often find whopping great rings of it as one specimen.

I've found that the likelyhood of it being full of maggots is more to do with the age of the specimen than the size. On occasion I've had great maggot free monsters.

As for spores, well, you're better leaving the rare ones be in my opinion, but don't worry too much about it. If there's one specimen, I usually leave it though.

Mat S

Joined: 07 Nov 2004
Posts: 282
Location: Leicester

Posted: Mon Oct 17, 05 10:19 pm Post subject:
Hopefully I'll go back for it later in the week. My fire extinguisher based wood stove was a partial success. Needs more air inlets at the bottom. Photos when I've got it working well..

footprints

Joined: 26 May 2005
Posts: 234
Location: North Wales

Posted: Tue Oct 18, 05 5:33 am Post subject:

Mat S wrote:

Hopefully I'll go back for it later in the week.

My fire extinguisher based wood stove was a partial success. Needs more air inlets at the bottom. Photos when I've got it working well..

Can you post a picture of the woodstove? I have a gas bottle woodstove that has been in use (and heating water/cooking) for about 12 years. It cost me about £40 to make (glass for the firedoor the most expensive part, copper boiler a fiver.) and costs about a tenner a week to run on coal.
We are about to rearrange some of our living room (see tip) and it will be replaced (small tear in the eye)

Making the stove was my pet project at the time. I thought at the time that it was so successful that I drew plans /cutting list/and how to do it details, hoping that I might sell them on the net (like shareware?)
Anyway to cut to the chase I never did post on the net, but I have always had a thing for homemade stoves

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