Locomotoring

I was feeling restless this Monday. Even though it was a working day, I decided to go out on a short afternoon hike. Further inland from where we are, the tule fog had descended on the central valley and was squatting for solid 3 weeks and counting. Here in the Bay Area, the sun was up, but it didn’t carry warmth. The morning dew was still lingering and I noticed spider webs. There were so many that the grassland looked covered in dandelion tufts. I go to this park often, I am sure I have been over couple dozen times in the last three years and the web tufts managed to surprise and delight me.

The grassland itself presented diversity this early in the winter – the fallen leaves, dry grass from last season, new generation of grass, moss and other shrubs existed side by side. I chose a trail I take less often and came across a large deer family and this afternoon, they chose not to run away upon seeing me. Later, on the same trail, I found my local oyster mushroom foraging patch!

If I had explicitly gone foraging, I would have had gloves and bags. But I hadn’t. So, I picked the oyster lot gently with my fingers and put them in my hat. And I kept the hat gently in by backpack.

After I got home, out of abundance of caution, I took photos and uploaded on iNaturalist for confirmation and also asked my mushroom friend to confirm. I also opened up my big fat book of mushrooms, “Mushrooms of the Redwood Coast: A Comprehensive Guide to the Fungi of Coastal Northern California”, for confirmation. Oysters are a good beginner mushroom, there are not a whole lot of look alike varieties. My backyard on the other hand is great at producing mushrooms with death and poison in their names. They are still great fun though and create wonderful spore patterns. Wait till I get my hands on a microscope!