Chaga Mushrooms 2017

A phone post on some of the chaga mushrooms I’m seeing in this new year and also other wintery sights of interest from our Maritime forests. The above photo reminds me of a hidden puzzle game or a piece of art you can’t stop staring at it. 

Ice pans or ice disc, first time I witness these around here. I’ve read they can on occasion be quite large, these little ones stayed spinning around this pool for sometime, made for a good rest spot after leaving the birch woods, this was a few days ago and below we get to zone in on how you can usually tell from several hundred feet if a chaga mushroom is a good size for gathering.

 If from afar you see a snow cap on a dark hump on a tree trunk in a hardwood forest with lots of birch in the mix then this calls for a closer look, real simple. Here we see one near the center right of above photo.

Ah, this chaga horn appears to be not too high up the tree. I can chop it at eye level, notice the smaller one close by.

Looking down hill into the valley and mountain across, this chaga harvesting is quite pleasant.

I’m surprised this photo is not more blurry as my out stretched arm was trembling from the weight while I was trying to hold and take this phone photo with the other hand. The pains I will go through to show off my 2017 chaga.

Anyway, now back home it is fresh chaga and matsutake, rosehip tea time. Cheers

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Chaga and shelving tooth

Last evening I was out foraging for some wild Enoki mushrooms (Flammulina velutipes) when I noticed this very large group of Shelving tooth (climacodon septentrionale) as I approached a hundred feet closer I was pleasantly surprised to find a nice Chaga mushroom (Inonotus Obliquus) on the next tree beside it as my Chaga supply is getting a little low. You may need to click on the photo to see the Chaga.

This Shelving tooth was in exceptional shape as it would have come to fruit last Sept or Oct, so it hung in valiantly throughout the winter.

Here is the under side of the shelving tooth, some folks also call this mushroom Northern tooth, notice the teeth instead of gills or pores.

Here is the Chaga mushroom up close.

Here is the Chaga trimmed up and ready to be chopped and taken home for slicing and drying.

My boot is a size 12 so this Chaga is around 10 inches by  six inches across, probably weighs 3 lbs before drying. If you have health issues take my advise, do some internet research on Chaga, I’m not selling it here, lots of folks are doing so on Ebay check it out. Look for a supplier who only harvest Chaga from living birches which produce leaves during the growing season.

Today we had record temperatures over 77 degrees with the day starting off around 40 degrees, a bit warm for maple sugar weather for the folks a mile down the road from the chaga and the boot, though many were out enjoying a taste at the sugar camp. cheers for now